WILLMAR -- Fernando Rico-Guevarra, 33, of Spicer, pleaded guilty Tuesday to felony charges for selling methamphetamine and aggravated forgery and a misdemeanor for identity theft.
As part of a plea agreement in Kandiyohi County District Court, three additional felony drug sale charges, and 10 gross misdemeanor charges for giving a court official the name or date of birth of another, will be dismissed. Rico-Guevarra is seeking a cap of 74 months on his prison sentence. The man, who is also known as Omar Ernesto Soria, will be sentenced on April 1.
The first set of charges -- three felonies for first-degree controlled substance crimes for possessing 47 grams of meth -- were filed in October after CEE-VI Drug Task Force agents and other law enforcement served a search warrant on the rural Spicer home Rico-Guevarra shared with Trisha Mae Schrupp, 27.
Schrupp is scheduled for an April 9 jury trial on four drug-sale felony charges, plus a felony and a gross misdemeanor for bringing meth into the county jail inside of her body. Those charges were filed after a search by medical professionals at Rice Memorial Hospital revealed a grocery bag containing meth inside of the lower portion of her vagina.
During the search of the rural Spicer home, officers located plastic cups containing 47 grams of a substance that tested positive for meth. They also found drug paraphernalia, cell phones, drug cutting agents, digital scales, marijuana, a computer, camera and global positioning unit in a room. The property also had a surveillance camera positioned to view the exterior of the home, with a monitor in the same bedroom.
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In December, Rico-Guevarra was charged with the felony for aggravated forgery, the 10 gross misdemeanors for giving a false name and identity theft after Willmar police were contacted by a man who identified himself as Omar Ernesto Soria. He said a person in the county jail was impersonating him, that he lives in Arlington and has had numerous problems with someone in Willmar using his name and date of birth. Further investigation revealed that the man in jail had been detained by agents from the federal Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, identified himself as Fernando Rico-Guevarra and admitted he was a Mexican national.
A search of the state Department of Vehicle Services record verified the Arlington man's story, with one driver's license consistent with the man in jail in Willmar and another consistent with real Soria in Arlington. Rico-Guevarra had appeared in court 10 times since September 1999 under the false name.
The final charge, a first-degree drug sale charge for selling 10 grams or more of cocaine, heroin or meth in a 90-day period, was filed Jan. 31. The charge was for selling an ounce of meth to a drug task force informant just hours before agents served the warrant and searched the couple's Spicer home in October.
Agents provided the informant with money to pay off a drug debt and later with $1,000 to buy the meth. During a traffic stop, officers found that Rico-Guevarra had the CEE-VI money from both the drug debt payment and the drug buy.
