Woman pleads guilty to 5 counts of selling heroin

By Neal Putnam

A Ramona woman pleaded guilty to five counts of selling heroin, sometimes out of a Main Street thrift store, and faces up to eight years in state prison.

Monica Leslie Tejero, 46, will be sentenced in January 2012 by San Diego Superior Court Judge Charles Gill. She remains free on $100,000 bond.

“She pleaded guilty to the sheet. She pleaded guilty to everything,” said Deputy District Attorney Carlos Campbell.

Campbell said the judge agreed not to sentence her to more than eight years, with probation ruled out. He said that multiple heroin sales with a prior heroin sale are “a mandatory state prison” sentence.

Campbell said the maximum term is 37 years and four months. The prior heroin sale would include the current charges. Tejero also has a burglary conviction from 1988, according to court records.

A message was left for Tejero’s attorney, but he could not be reached for comment. She is no longer employed at the Ramona Food & Clothes Closet at 773 Main St. She was arrested along with two others on June 2.

On Oct. 14 she also pleaded guilty to possession of heroin for sale on June 2 at a location within 1,000 feet of a school.

She and her attorney opted to waive a preliminary hearing Aug. 26 and agreed to stand trial without calling witnesses. Tejero is the last defendant left facing charges after two others pleaded guilty July 29 to one count each of selling heroin.

Chris Melero, 34, of Ramona, and Zazil Saul, 22, of Imperial Beach, were sentenced to time already served in jail. They were fined and placed on three years probation.

Court records allege Tejero sold heroin to an informant four times either in the store or in the parking lot outside. The largest sale of heroin, 17.7 grams, occurred at her Ramona apartment on March 14 to an informant. The other alleged sales took place earlier in February and March with smaller amounts of the drug.