North Bay ice cream vendor caught selling cocaine, police say

Three North Bay street vendors were arrested in June for allegedly selling cocaine near an elementary school, officials announced in a Monday press release.

In a Monday announcement, the Santa Rosa Police Department explained that detectives from its narcotics unit had launched an investigation in April into Victor Martinez-Diaz, 49, whom they suspected of dealing cocaine on West 9th Street near Abraham Lincoln Elementary School. Martinez-Diaz also had a legal business selling ice cream and other snacks, police said. 

SRPD said Martinez-Diaz rode a tricycle with his products in various containers and mainly sold his wares — both legal and illegal — on the same stretch of West 9th Street. The operation was busted June 12, after an undercover detective bought a gram of cocaine from Martinez-Diaz in that same area, police said. 

The two other suspects, Jose Cazares, 21 and Marcos Ambrosio-Cortes, 29, were also identified in connection with the months-long investigation, SRPD said, after they were seen getting in a vehicle that was under surveillance by detectives.

All three suspects “conspired together” to sell the drugs, Patricia Seffens, a spokesperson for the Santa Rosa Police Department, told SFGATE. Martinez-Diaz and Ambrosio-Cortes lived together, Seffens said, but she was not immediately sure of the connection between all three men other than that they all worked as street vendors.

Police executed search warrants on two vehicles and two other locations in conjunction with the investigation, one of which was where Martinez-Diaz and Ambrosio-Cortes lived, Seffens told SFGATE. In those searches, detectives found nearly 10 grams of cocaine, 17 grams of methamphetamine and more than $10,000 in cash, in addition to three street vendor bicycles, a fanny pack with a semi-automatic handgun inside, a digital scale and hundreds of small plastic zip-top bags, according to the Monday statement.

All three suspects were booked into the Sonoma County Jail that same day, June 12, on suspicion of possession of controlled substance for sale, transport of controlled substance for sale and conspiracy. Cazares was booked on suspicion of an additional charge of being armed while dealing drugs.

The three men were released from jail on pretrial supervision on June 16, Seffens said, and are free while they await trial.