An Idaho man was sentenced to nearly 6 years in prison  after being caught along Interstate 70 in Central Kansas with packages of fentanyl that he was transporting cross-country.

According to court documents, 24-year-old Brian Hilario Delgado Mayorga of Burley, Idaho, pleaded guilty to one count of possession with intent to distribute fentanyl.

In May 2024, a Geary County Sheriff’s deputy stopped Mayorga on Interstate 70 after observing him make an unsafe driving maneuver. When the deputy asked Mayorga questions about his route, Mayorga said he was coming from Idaho and was on his way to visit his grandparents in Missouri. The deputy became suspicious partly because Mayorga didn’t know his grandparents’ address and because license plate readers placed him in California and Nevada on the previous day, not Idaho.

Mayorga refused to allow the deputy to search his vehicle, and a K9 unit was dispatched to the scene. After the K9 detected the odor of narcotics coming from Mayorga’s vehicle, deputies had probable cause to search. Inside the vehicle, officers found several heat-sealed packages of narcotics that laboratory results later determined to be approximately 4,000 grams of fentanyl.

Mayorga was arrested and admitted he picked up the narcotics in the Los Angeles area. He stated it was his second trip and that he was paid $8,000.00 on the first trip. Officers also found a firearm and $1,419 in cash in the vehicle.

“The Midwest is often used as a corridor for drug traffickers transporting their products from one region of the country to another,” said U.S. Attorney Ryan A. Kriegshauser. “The Department of Justice is grateful to the Geary County Sheriff’s Office for its vigilance and attention to detail. Local law enforcement agencies are on the front line when it comes to foiling the plans of criminals on these road trips and seizing illegal narcotics. We are happy to stand beside them and prosecute these cases federally when warranted.”

“At the time of his arrest, Mayorga was traveling across the country with roughly 390,000 deadly doses of fentanyl,” DEA St. Louis Field Division Special Agent in Charge Steven Hofer said. “The sentencing is due in part to the astute work of the Geary County Sheriff’s Office and collaboration of federal and local resources. It’s because of partnerships like this that drug traffickers are dealt blow-after-blow in their attempt to turn profits in the Midwest.”

The Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) and the Geary County Sheriff’s Office investigated the case