The U.S. attorney's office for the Middle District of Pennsylvania announced that a 40-year-old Mexican national who resided in Chicago at the time of his arrest, was sentenced Monday to serve 10 years in prison by U.S. District Court Judge Robert D. Mariani in Scranton, for his role in a drug conspiracy that was responsible for distributing large quantities of heroin during a four-year time period in Monroe, Carbon, Montgomery and Berks counties.

According to U.S. Attorney Peter Smith, the defendant, Romualdo Hermosillo-Avendano, also known as "Flaco," previously admitted to distributing more than one kilogram of heroin via courier from Chicago to Pennsylvania during December 2013-January 2014.A kilogram of heroin is equivalent to more than 33,000 retail bags of heroin.Hermosillo-Avendano was indicted by a federal grand jury in March 2014, as a result of an investigation by the Drug Enforcement Administration, Homeland Security Investigations, the Pennsylvania State Police, the Pennsylvania Attorney General's Office, Berks and Montgomery detectives.Mariani also ordered the defendant to serve five years on supervised release following his prison sentence. The defendant faces possible deportation.This case was brought as part of a districtwide initiative to combat the nationwide epidemic regarding the use and distribution of heroin.