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Maria Teresa Rivera-Lopez has been convicted of bringing her children to drug deals.

Mom Sentenced For Bringing Kids To Drug Deals

Sheriff's Office Says Couple Used Son To Negotiate Deals

POSTED: 10:59 am MDT August 19, 2008
UPDATED: 11:43 am MDT August 19, 2008

The wife of a convicted drug dealer could be sent back to Mexico after she was found guilty Monday of bringing her two children to drug deals.

Maria Teresa Rivera-Lopez was convicted of child abuse, the Summit Daily News reported. Her husband, Carlos Rivera-Lopez, was sentenced last Monday to six years in prison for dealing cocaine.

The Silverthorne couple was arrested in April after undercover agents found them using their 14-year-old son to negotiate drug deals over the phone. The teen was used to translate and to relay information, a spokesman with the Summit County Drug Task Force told 7NEWS.

When the undercover agent met up with them, Rivera-Lopez had her 8-year-old and 3-year-old children in the car.

Rivera-Lopez has spent almost four months in jail on an Immigration and Customs Enforcement hold so the judge sentenced her to time already served. He said she had already been punished by having her children removed from her home. They are staying with her sister in California, the newspaper reported.

"This really is a shocking and sickening situation where children were brought to drug deals," said Deputy District Attorney Scott Turner.

During a search of the couple's home, a deputy's K9 detected narcotics in several areas of the house, including near children's toys, the newspaper said. Officers also found posters of marijuana as well as figurines with marijuana leaves on them in the children's bedroom, the newspaper reported.

The search also found multiple documents with different identities, money, 43 grams of marijuana, 20 marijuana cigarette butts and 85 grams of cocaine.

Turner said the court could also decide whether to terminate Rivera-Lopez's rights as a mother to her two children.

ICE will now evaluate Rivera-Lopez's immigration status.


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