Prineville drug, alcohol counselor charged with heroin trafficking

A Prineville man who recently worked as a drug and alcohol counselor was arrested in a guns-drawn traffic stop in Madras this week, accused of trafficking heroin from the Portland area to locations around Central Oregon, drug agents said Thursday.

Ryan Kenneth Smith, 27, was arrested Monday by the Central Oregon Drug Enforcement Team on several heroin and methamphetamine possession and distribution charges, as well as heroin manufacturing, said Lt. Ken Mannix. He was taken to the Jefferson County Jail, where he remained held Thursday on $175,000 bail.

Mannix said the investigation began nearly two months ago, when detectives began receiving information about Smith’s heroin trafficking. Detectives learned of Smith’s travels to the Portland area to obtain heroin and return to Central Oregon to sell the product.

Drug agents also learned Smith was employed recently as a drug and alcohol counselor in Central Oregon, he added.

Detectives had information that Smith was returning to Central Oregon on Monday after buying a large quantity of heroin in Portland, Mannix said.

Detectives found and stopped Smith around 3:30 p.m. Monday as he entered Madras at the wheel of a 2008 Toyota FJ Cruiser, the lieutenant said. High-risk stop protocols were followed, “given Smith’s past history and recent intelligence information obtained by CODE detectives,” Mannix said in a news release.

A search of Smith’s SUV turned up “a commercial amount of heroin,” Mannix said, declining to be more specific, as well as a user amount of meth, scales, packaging material and other evidence of drug sales and manufacturing.