SAN MATEO — Since June 2021, undercover agents have been quietly following two men using surveillance and cars secretly rigged with hidden cameras to build a firearms and methamphetamine sales case, court records show.
Last week, unsealed court records revealed federal charges against brothers Vicente Arellano-Buenrostro Jr., and Juan Arellano, who remain in Santa Rita Jail in Dublin pending the outcome of a detention hearing. Both are charged with conspiracy, unlicensed gun sales, and methamphetamine distribution, while Arellano-Buenrostro faces an additional charge alleging the sale of a machine gun.
During the operation, led by the Drug Enforcement Administration and the San Mateo Sheriff, authorities bought 14 guns and six pounds of methamphetamine in undercover buys, some of which were caught on camera, according to the criminal complaint. The 14 guns included homemade machine guns and firearms with no serial numbers, commonly known as ghost guns, authorities say.
The lead defendant, Arellano-Buenrostro, is an East Palo Alto native who lives in Arizona. During one meet-up with an undercover DEA agent, he allegedly explained that he acquired the firearms in Arizona and would ship them up to “his boy” in the Bay Area for distribution, Joseph Centofranchi, a special agent with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, & Explosives, wrote in the complaint.
On June 21, 2021, the agent allegedly asked Arellano for methamphetamine, and Arellano replied he didn’t have any but would “ask around” and “figure it out.” Several one-pound methamphetamine buys followed that conversation, the complaint alleges.