gang member that pleaded guilty to brandishing a firearm during a violent crime when he took part in a home-invasion robbery in Coronado was sentenced Friday to 25 years in federal prison on Friday.

Phillip McMillen, 40, admitted participating in a series of violent crimes on behalf of the Mexican Mafia, including attempted murder, robbery, kidnapping, extortion and drug trafficking, Assistant U.S. Attorney John Parmley said.

McMillen also pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit racketeering, and Parmley said McMillen was armed with a gun during the Coronado robbery and when he tried to kidnap a man in Chula Vista.

The defendant, a former member of a National City street gang, was swept up in a yearlong investigation led by the gangs section of the San Diego Violent Crimes Task Force.

McMillen, who entered his guilty plea last August, was sentenced by U.S. District Court Judge Janis Sammartino.

Mexican authorities on Saturday announced the arrest of 46 suspected drug gang members in police operations across the country, with 36 of those arrested accused of being members of La Familia Michoacana and the remaining 10 part of the Zetas gang.

Mexico's Ministry of Public Security reported that the 36 suspected members of La Familia were arrested in the southern Mexican state Jalisco after police intelligence tracked the gang following a brazen attack on a federal police aircraft.

A land and air operation took place to capture the gang during a meeting they were having in the quiet village of Las Lomas. Upon arrival, police engaged in a shootout that killed 11 suspects and injured two police officers. Following the firefight, 36 members of the drug cartel were arrested.

Mexican authorities say the 36 men had been meeting to coordinate an attack on a rival criminal gang.

A huge haul of arms, some 21,000 rounds of ammunition and nearly 100 rifles and handguns, were seized at the scene.

The La Familia cartel has been weakened since a splintering off of its leadership in December 2010 saw the creation of spin-off drug gang "Los Caballeros Templarios". It is believed that at least 2,000 people have been displaced in southern Michoacan state due to factional fighting within the La Familia cartel.

"There have been over 600 members of La Familia detained by authorities in the last four years. With yesterday's operation, the number is now close to 700 members arrested from this criminal group. This is very relevant but, perhaps the most relevant is that the people who have been displaced by these criminals can now return to their communities," said Commissioner General of the Federal Police Facundo Rosas.

Authorities also on Saturday announced the arrest of 10 members of the notorious Zetas drug gang and the rescue of a kidnap victim in the tourist state of Quintana Roo. Federal Police said they seized a jeep and nearly 50 weapons at the scene.

"In another part of the country an operation took place in the state of Quintana Roo. The Federal Police have freed a person of 30 years who had been held prisoner by the gang since May 21. This operation arrested ten members of the criminal organization known as the Zetas, responsible for such offences as extortion, kidnappings and the sale of drugs," said Rosas.

Quintana Roo state is home to the tourist hotspot of Cancun, which attracts millions of U.S. and European tourists annually with its Caribbean beaches and proximity to Mayan ruins on the Yucatan Peninsula.

The Zetas, known for their brutality and blamed for some of the worst atrocities in Mexico's drug war, have been moving east towards the country's Caribbean resort cities such as Cancun, authorities say.

Iran threatened Saturday to allow the transit of illegal drugs through its territory to Europe if the West continues to criticize the Islamic nation for its practice of executing drug traffickers.
Mohammad Javad Larijani, the head of Iran's High Council for Human Rights, said Iran was sacrificing blood in fighting drug trafficking and suggested it is unfair that it is then condemned by the West for executing smugglers.
"Westerners have to either be Iran's partner in the fight against drug traffickers or we must think otherwise and, for instance, allow the transit" of drugs across Iranian territory, Larijani said in a comment posted on the judiciary's website Saturday.
He said such a move would reduce the number of overall executions in Iran by 74 per cent, "but the way will be paved for the smuggling of narcotics to Europe."
U.N. officials have in the past warned that a "heroin tsunami" could hit Europe if the drug interdiction by Iran is weakened.
Iran says it has lost more than 3,700 troops in the fight against drug traffickers and 11,000 more have been injured to date since 1979, when the Islamic Revolution brought hard-line clerics to power.
"Unfortunately, Western countries not only provide no assistance to Iran in the fight against drug trafficking, they condemn us every year for punishing drug smugglers," Larijani said.
Iran has also called on Europe to offer financial support to its fight against trafficking.
Iran lies along a major drug route between Afghanistan — which accounts for more than 90 per cent of the world's illicit opium and heroin production — and Europe.
Iranian authorities have taken several steps to stop trafficking, including the building of dikes and trenches along large portions of its roughly 560-mile (900-kilometre) border with Afghanistan. Officials also seize more than three tons of narcotics each day, according to official statistics.

After getting probation three times for marijuana convictions in New Orleans, a man moved out of the city — and landed a life prison sentence the fourth time around.

Cornell Hood II was sentenced Thursday in Covington as a repeat offender following his conviction on a charge of attempting to possess and distribute marijuana.

According to The Times-Picayune, Hood moved from New Orleans after he pleaded guilty in 2009 to two marijuana-related charges and received five years of probation. In 2005, he received his first strike — and five years of probation — after pleading guilty in New Orleans to possessing and intending to distribute marijuana.

Authorities said Hood's probation officer found about two pounds of marijuana during a routine visit to Hood's Slidell-area home on Sept. 27. Prosecutors charged him with possession with intent to distribute marijuana.

At Hood's one-day trial, the state's evidence included a digital scale and about a dozen bags that had contained marijuana before being seized from the house. Deputies also found $1,600 in cash and a student-loan application with Hood's name on it inside of a night stand.

A jury deliberated for less than two hours and convicted Hood of a reduced charge, which usually carries no more than 15 years' imprisonment. But Assistant District Attorney Nick Noriea Jr. then used Hood's past convictions on Thursday to argue that he was a career criminal.

Drug offenders in Louisiana are subject to life imprisonment after being convicted three or more times of a crime that carries a maximum sentence exceeding 10 years.

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The ice cream parlor owner charged with selling cocaine from his popular shop has five drug-dealing convictions in New Jersey, prosecutors told Clarkstown Justice Howard Gerber, who refused to grant bail for Patrick Kilduff during a court appearance Friday.

A grand jury Monday will hear the Clarkstown police charges accusing Kilduff of selling cocaine and other drugs out of his Wally's Ice Cream Parlour.

A staple in the downtown business district for years before it was raided by police Tuesday, Wally's drew teenagers and parents with their small children. The store's front patio was a gathering place for customers on hot afternoons and warm evenings.

On Friday morning, Kilduff, 36, stood with his wrists shackled at the waist next to his lawyer, public defender Walter Sakowski. Kilduff didn't speak during the session.

Sakowski and prosecutor Robert Trudell agreed the judge could not set bail based on Kilduff's New Jersey convictions. He also had a conviction for possessing hypodermic needles in Myrtle Beach. S.C.

Gerber told the lawyers that he couldn't consider setting bail because he didn't have Kilduff's entire criminal record.

"He has five felony convictions in the state of New Jersey," Trudell told Gerber on Friday, urging the judge to keep Kilduff in jail.

"If the court has an alternative or disagrees, the people request $250,000 bail," Trudell said.

Kilduff's record goes back to at least December 1998 when he and a New City man were arrested on drug-possession charges — 850 diazepam (Valium) pills in Mahwah, N.J. He also was charged as recently as 2007 with drug counts in New Jersey.

Kilduff was released from probation last summer on his latest New Jersey conviction, Rockland District Attorney Thomas Zugibe said.

If the grand jury doesn't return an indictment Monday, Kilduff will be brought back to court in the afternoon for a hearing on whether he still can be held. A felony indictment would move the prosecution from Town Court to the criminal court in the Rockland County Courthouse.