<p>Ask anybody in this small town about Mario Armas and you'll get the same answer.</p><p>"He always seemed like a good guy," said Joe Murray, owner of Blue Ribbon Shoe Shop in downtown Rome. "Everybody knows him."</p><p>The outgoing Armas would stop in at least once a week to get his Italian leather shoes shined at the store, which has been in the same location since 1914. He always wore suits and kept his long hair pulled back neatly in a ponytail, Murray said.</p><p>But that's a different picture than what federal prosecutors are painting of the pawn shop owner and real estate businessman.</p><p>Armas, 45, who also goes by Mario Doninelli, is on trial in U.S. District Court this week for conspiring with two professional rodeo workers and another man to distribute more than a ton of marijuana in the Rome area between 2003 and 2004. Prosecutors say he was the ringleader of the drug operation, and the drug smuggling has been linked to other crimes, including kidnapping, burglary and laundering the profits of drug deals, according to court documents.</p><p>The story starts in 2002 when rodeo worker Kevin Redstrom met a man named Jimmy Collins, who offered Redstrom the chance to invest $15,000 in a bonding business, according to court documents. Redstrom told fellow rodeo worker Lonnie Merren about the investment opportunity, and Merren got Armas involved.</p><p>In early 2003, Collins confessed he was dealing drugs not bonds, but Armas continued to invest, according to court documents.</p><p>From January to April that year, Armas bankrolled six or seven trips where Merren and Redstrom took a horse trailer containing hundreds of thousands of dollars to Arizona to buy more than 2,200 pounds of marijuana. In May 2003, a $1 million drug deal went wrong when the couriers were kidnapped by the supplier in Phoenix.</p><p>The money instead went to pay ransom for the couriers, and Armas threatened Collins and his family when he learned his money was lost, according to court documents.</p><p>Prosecutors say Armas and two armed men kidnapped Redstrom to get Collins to talk about the lost money.</p><p>Armas also orchestrated a home invasion robbery in 2004 to steal $8 million that was believed to be at the house, according to court documents. The money was not there, and the two men who robbed the house, Carol Jackson and Omar Lee, told police that Armas spearheaded the crime, according to court documents.</p><p>Collins was arrested in New Mexico in 2004 on a warrant sworn out by Armas, who said in a sworn statement that Collins had failed to repay a $1.1 million loan to Armas, according to court documents. Collins, who is not charged in this case, became a confidential informant for federal investigators looking into the smuggling operation beginning in 2005.</p><p>Armas' attorney, Edward Garland, says his client is innocent and was duped by "some local crooks."</p><p>"He's been victimized," Garland said Monday during a break from jury selection for the trial.</p><p>Both Merren and Redstrom have pleaded guilty to the charges against them and are expected to testify against Armas during the trial.</p><p>Armas, who owns multiple businesses and properties in the Rome area, pleaded not guilty to the charges after his arrest a year ago. He faces a minimum of 25 years in prison if convicted.</p><p>The trial was supposed to begin in January, but it was delayed to give prosecutors and defense attorneys time to study the volume of evidence.</p>
