Minnesota woman accused of transporting ‘baseball-sized’ balls of meth

CROOKSTON, Minn. - A Crookston woman accused of helping another woman bring baseball-sized balls of meth from Minneapolis to Grand Forks, N.D., could receive 30 years in prison and a $1 million fine if she is convicted.
Amy Nicole Heinle, 33, is charged in Polk County with a first-degree felony charge of possessing a controlled substance.
The charges stem from an early January 2016 drug stakeout at the Crookston Wal-Mart, where a confidential informant met Ashley Kay Herrin, 31, and Derek William Jung, 34, both of Crookston.
Court documents say officers listened to the ensuing conversation before obtaining a search warrant and searching Herrin and Jung in the nearby town of Gentilly. Heinle told officers she drove to Minneapolis and picked up Herrin, who had two packages each containing “just under the size of a baseball of methamphetamine,” and brought her to Grand Forks and then Crookston.
Both Herrin and Jung pleaded guilty in the case last year, and related court papers say the women put money into the jail account for Christopher Rolda Espericueta, 42, of Crookston, who was being held in the Northwest Regional Corrections Center on drug charges.
In 2015, Espericueta was arrested in an East Grand Forks meth bust, and eventually he was charged in federal court for selling a controlled substance. If convicted at a trial set to begin March 14, Espericueta faces between 20 years and life in prison.