In a rare Chicago methamphetamine bust, Drug Enforcement Administration agents, using a wired informant, arrested three men and a woman on March 11 when the group attempted to sell a pound of the drug on the city’s Northwest Side.

The arrest led to the discovery of two storage sheds containing about 200 pounds of marijuana and another 6 pounds of methamphetamines. According to DEA officials and public health experts, the 7 pounds of meth seized is a surprisingly large amount in a city gripped by heroin and crack addiction, but mostly free of a meth drug trade.

“It sounds pretty big for Chicago,” said Larry Ouellet, director of community outreach intervention projects for the University of Illinois at Chicago. “If you have a bar graph [of drug use in Chicago], meth will be almost invisible compared to heroin, coke and marijuana.”

According to Ouellet and Special Agent Will Taylor, a public information officer for the DEA, the meth seized may have been making a stop in Chicago before being moved to a different area. The city is often a midpoint between smaller surrounding cities and Mexico.

“We do see large seizures, but lots of times it’s more of a transshipment point,” Taylor said. “It’s moving to another state or another area. [In Chicago], we don’t see a lot of meth. When I say a lot, it’s not comparable to heroin and crack cocaine that sort of plague this area.”

Assistant U.S.  Attorney Stephen Chan Lee said this was the first meth case he had ever handled. A source from the U.S. Attorney’s office said methamphetamine cases in any of the federal courts of Illinois were exceedingly rare.

According to authorities, this case never would have happened were it not for the help of a “cooperating source,” who worked with the DEA to arrange the purchase of a pound of meth from two individuals identified as José Diaz and Alberto Negron.

According to Taylor, who stressed that he could not speak about the specifics of the case, a cooperating source is typically someone who is not an employee of the DEA or any other law enforcement agency but helps to facilitate an arrest or drug seizure.

“It’s usually someone who is cooperating on behalf of us,” Taylor said. “Either they could be cooperating for…monetary reasons if they are getting paid, or they may have a pending criminal case against them … and the prosecutor will take it into consideration that they helped us.”

According to the criminal complaint filed on March 12, the source, who cannot be named for reasons regarding his safety, made recorded phone calls starting in February to Diaz and Negron to arrange the purchase of meth. The source is also said to have worn a recording device while meeting with Diaz and Negron, along with a man identified as Rigoberto Arreola-Cianca, who is accused of supplying the meth, and Seyra Villalobos, who is accused of storing the drugs in her house.

On March 11, the source,and an undercover DEA agent, met with Diaz, Negron, Arreola-Cianca and Villalobos for the final time, the complaint states. Diaz met with the source and the DEA agent outside, investigators said, and the agent showed Diaz $20,000 in cash to pay for the pound of meth. After speaking with Diaz briefly, the source allegedly entered Villalobos’ house on the 3900 block of North Drake Avenue to see if the drugs were inside the house. He saw the pound of meth in Villalobos’ house and then told them he was going to go back outside to get the money, the complaint alleges.

After he left the house, DEA agents rushed in, seized the drugs and arrested Diaz, Villalobos,  Arreola-Cianca and Negron,  according to the complaint.

Both Diaz’s home and cell phone numbers had been disconnected when The Chronicle placed calls on March 17.

Villalobos worked as a waitress at La Estrella Bar on Milwaukee Avenue, agents said,  where she met Arreola-Cianca, known as “El Gordo.” She allegedly put Diaz, Negron and the source in contact with Arreola-Cianca so he could sell them the meth.

During the arrest, a receipt was found above the visor of Arreola-Cianca’s truck for a storage shed at Lock Up Self Storage on North Kedzie Avenue, agents said. After confirming the shed was Arreola-Cianca’s, investigators allege the agents searched the shed and found 200 pounds of marijuana and six pounds of meth.

The six pounds seized at the storage shed meant the DEA was able to take seven pounds of meth off the street in a few hours. No one was able to estimate how much of the drug passes through Chicago.

According to Ouellet, the 200 pounds of marijuana seized will not make a dent in Chicago’s considerable marijuana market.

“It’s a sizable arrest,” Ouellet said. “But there’s a lot of marijuana in Chicago. I’d be surprised if anybody noticed.”

According to the criminal complaint, Diaz told agents that Villalobos’ husband lives in Mexico and brings a lot of drugs into the United States. Taylor said despite the attention paid to homegrown meth-labs, almost all of the meth sold and consumed in the United States is smuggled from Mexico.

“The vast majority [of meth] that is consumed in the [United States], well over 90 percent originates from Mexico,”

Taylor said.

According to the criminal complaint, Diaz, Negron, Arreola-Cianca and Villalobos admitted to their involvement in the attempted drug sale. All four of them are still in custody. According to Lee, if convicted, each of them faces at least five years in prison.