SAN FRANCISCO – Darwin Villatoro, 29, is headed to federal prison after pleading guilty to trafficking heroin and cocaine base in San Francisco’s notoriously blighted Tenderloin district. Villatoro was sentenced today to two years and four months behind bars, a consequence of repeated run-ins with law enforcement and a blatant disregard for the law.
According to court documents, Villatoro’s criminal activity spanned over a year, with three separate arrests between January 2019 and January 2020. The first, on January 28, 2019, saw him fleeing police on Golden Gate Avenue while violating a court-ordered stay-away order. A search of his discarded backpack revealed a cocktail of narcotics: 22 bindles of heroin, five of methamphetamine, and 10 of cocaine base. He was back at it just ten months later.
On October 26, 2019, officers found Villatoro again at Golden Gate Avenue and Larkin Street, flagrantly violating the same stay-away order and operating within 1,000 feet of both the Tenderloin Community Elementary School and the N. Helen Diller Civic Center Playground – a particularly egregious detail. This time, a foot chase resulted in the recovery of 26 more bindles of heroin and eight of cocaine base. The cycle continued.
The final straw came on January 27, 2020, once more on Golden Gate Avenue, again in defiance of the stay-away order. This arrest yielded a substantial haul: 75 bindles of cocaine base, 13 packages of fentanyl, 22 bindles of heroin, and 11 individually wrapped packages of methamphetamine. A federal grand jury indicted Villatoro on February 13, 2020, charging him with possession with intent to distribute heroin, possession with intent to distribute heroin within 1,000 feet of a school or playground, and possession with intent to distribute cocaine base, all violations of 21 U.S.C. § § 841(a)(1) and (b)(1)(C).
Villatoro’s actions contribute to the ongoing crisis in the Tenderloin, a neighborhood long plagued by open-air drug dealing. Law enforcement sources confirm the area is a magnet for drug users and dealers across the Bay Area, accounting for 56 percent of all drug sales incidents booked by the San Francisco Police Department in fiscal year 2017–2018 – a staggering statistic. The case is part of the Federal Initiative for the Tenderloin, a multi-agency effort to combat crime in the area.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Yoosun Koh prosecuted the case, the result of a joint investigation by the Drug Enforcement Administration and the San Francisco Police Department. Villatoro, who has been in custody since March 16, 2020, will begin serving his sentence immediately. While two years is a sentence, it remains to be seen if it will deter others from flooding the Tenderloin with poison.
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Key Facts
- State: California
- Agency: DOJ USAO
- Category: Drug Trafficking
- Source: Official Source ↗
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