Five people will spend years behind bars for their roles in a California-based drug trafficking ring that authorities say shipped meth to the Fox Valley region.
According to a news release from U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Wisconsin, the sentencings were the result of guilty pleas entered by the five people between August 30, 2019, and October 18, 2019.
Tou Lee Xiong received the longest sentence of 20 years in prison, with another 5 years of supervised release. Blia Lor was sentenced to more than 9 years in prison; Meng Xiong received 10 years; Cher Yang and Gwen Biersteker both got 5 years.
The news release states the defendants and others arranged for shipments of methamphetamine to arrive by car couriers and postal shipments from northern California to northeastern Wisconsin. Authorities said Tou Lee Xiong, who was a prisoner in the California prison system, used contraband phones to orchestrate shipments from sources in California.
Blia Lor and Gwen Biersteker, along with others, served as points of contact for distributing the meth in in the Fox Valley and Green Bay areas. Cher Yang provided funding for the operation and transported meth from Milwaukee to the Appleton area.
Authorities said Xiong traveled from California to take responsibility for the distribution networks and was caught by law enforcement with multiple pounds of methamphetamine and two handguns.
The news release states evidence collected throughout the case suggests the amount of meth connected to the group for the period it was active exceeded 100 pounds.
