A total of 18 people involved in a conspiracy in Columbus to distribute kilogram quantities of imported heroin, launder the money back to Mexico and run a fake immigration identification business have been indicted on federal charges, the U.S. Attorney's office announced Tuesday.

Diego Ernesto Castaneda-Garcia, no age or hometown provided, is identified as the leader of the drug trafficking operation that received imported heroin from Mexico and repackaged it for sale to heroin users around central Ohio. Twelve others in central Ohio were arrested and five others are being sought in California.

According to the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of Ohio in Columbus, workers would be smuggled into the United States from Mexico to Columbus to distribute heroin. The heroin was broken down and packaged into foil balls called "fechas" —  roughly translated to "coins" — that each contained 1/10th of a gram. Runners would go to public parking lots where they would sell the heroin to customers for $100 for 15 coins.

One of the co-conspirators would act as a dispatcher and take calls and coordinate the runners. Other conspirators would arrange for apartments and cars for use by the runners. Then others would work on fake identification documents for the workers, which included drivers' licenses, permanent resident alien cards and Social Security cards.

A portion of the profits was then wired by the defendants in increments just under $1,000 on multiple occasions from storefronts in Columbus back to Nayarit, a small state in western Mexico between the Sierra Madre mountain range and the Pacific Ocean.

"This organization went to great lengths to conceal their activities from law enforcement. However, today's arrests demonstrate that [Homeland Security Investigations] and our partners will be unyielding in our efforts to take down those who seek to profit from poisoning our community," said Vance Callander, HSI special agent in charge for Ohio and Michigan.