Drugs: Hooking Some Big Fish

The scheme was known as Operation Pisces, and Attorney General Edwin Meese last week hailed it as "remarkable." So it was: the largest and most successful undercover ploy in federal drug law enforcement history. Acting simultaneously in Los Angeles, Miami and New York City, U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration officials reeled in some 80 smugglers, dealers and middlemen, and issued arrest warrants for about 35 more. An additional 351 people had already been nabbed on the basis of tips from the three-year operation. About $49 million in cash and property, along with 19,000 lbs. of cocaine with a street value of $270 million or so, was also seized.

Pisces started small, when DEA agents posing as money launderers infiltrated the U.S. branch of the Colombian drug-smuggling cartel. Over time, the undercover cops won the confidence of higher-ups through efficient, discreet service. And they obtained unprecedented cooperation from authorities in Panama, where many of the drug Mafia's ill-gotten gains were traced. Besides netting hordes of drug traffickers, the coolly efficient agents showed a profit. Operation Pisces made $4.3 million in money-laundering commissions before the DEA wrapped up the operation.