Suburban Chicago man sentenced to 16 years in prison for drug, gun trafficking after being caught in sting

A man from Chicago's northwest suburbs was sentenced to 16 years in federal prison last week for trafficking drugs and guns, after he was caught in a sting a year and a half ago.

The U.S. Attorney's office said Efrain Jacobo, 44, sold methamphetamine, cocaine, and seven guns in a series of transactions in Joliet in the fall of 2024. Jacobo did not know the sales were a sting operation and the buyers were undercover law enforcement officers, prosecutors said.

On Dec. 17, 2024, Jacobo shared tracking data with the people he didn't know were undercover officers for a truck full of meth that was headed from Illinois to Texas, prosecutors said. The truck stopped at a shipping facility in Bolingbrook, Illinois, at Jacobo's direction, prosecutors said.

Investigators searched the truck and found than 150,000 grams of meth, prosecutors said. A search of a storage facility leased by Jacobo in Wheeling also turned up more than 1,800 grams of fentanyl, prosecutors said.

"Defendant plainly was a powerful and high-level drug dealer," Assistant U.S. Attorney Stephanie C. Stern argued in the government's sentencing memorandum, as quoted in a news release. "Drug sellers of any illegal narcotics have a negative impact on society.  They help fuel a drug trade that can devastate lives, families, and communities."

Jacobo, of Prospect Heights, pleaded guilty earlier this year to federal firearm and drug charges, prosecutors said. He was sentenced to 16 years in federal prison by U.S. District Judge Matthew F. Kennelly on Thursday of last week.