After his arrest in April, the Downtown resident told investigators he was a middleman in a fentanyl distribution pipeline. He received large quantities of medical supplies from suppliers, repackaged them, shipped them across the country, and kept a cut of the profits.
Somewhere along the pipeline, someone used another substance, the animal tranquilizer xylazine, to make the supply of fentanyl appear larger than it actually was.
On Friday, U.S. District Judge Jinsuk Ohta sentenced the agent, a 40-year-old forklift driver and drug user, to five years in federal prison. Earlier this year, he admitted in a plea agreement to possessing more than two pounds of fentanyl with intent to distribute the drug. He also confirmed that he tested positive for xylazine for fentanyl.
Xylazine, known as “trunk” or “trunk dope” when processed into fentanyl or heroin and sold on the street, can prolong the high of other drugs. But the substance, intended to sedate livestock such as horses and cows, leaves users unconscious and vulnerable for several hours, creates purulent wounds at the injection site, and can kill or amputation of limbs. It may also lead to.
Xylazine’s growing presence in the U.S. illicit drug supply has drawn the attention of law enforcement and lawmakers this year.a few months later New York Times article When it first put a broader spotlight on illegal drug use, a bipartisan group of lawmakers introduced identical bills in the House and Senate. legalize drugsMeanwhile, in April, the White House designated it as an “emerging threat””
It’s unclear exactly how prevalent xylazine is in the illegal drug supply in San Diego County, but Friday’s ruling provides more proof that “trunk dope” has reached San Diego and is the most detailed example yet. It became one of the
“We are aware of this emerging drug and the risks associated with it,” Lt. David Ladue, a spokesperson for the San Diego County Sheriff’s Department, said in an email Friday.
Ladue said the Sheriff’s Crime Lab, which processes and analyzes drugs seized by sheriff’s deputies and officers in most police departments in the county outside of San Diego, has completed 16 of 284 seizures so far in 2023. The presence of xylazine was detected.
That’s about 5.6 percent.That’s all about 4 percent Fentanyl samples that tested positive for xylazine 3 month pilot test program According to the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department.
In January, a spokesperson for the Drug Enforcement Agency’s San Diego Field Office said xylazine was detected 23 times in the past two fiscal years (four times in 2021 and 19 times in 2022) during testing of drugs seized in San Diego and Imperial counties. Reported that it was detected. .
The agency could not provide an update on those numbers by Friday, but a spokesperson said “many drugs” seized by the DEA and tested at local labs are temporary and therefore not necessarily He said it does not paint the same picture as the DEA. Local drugs will be supplied for testing conducted by the sheriff and police lab.
San Diego Police Lt. Adam Sharke said Friday that the city’s crime lab “identified (xylazine) in the sample,” but had not confirmed or tested it.
“It is uncontrolled and we only test for controlled substances,” Sharki wrote in an email. The institute does not plan to start testing “unless it is controlled,” he said.
a October DEA Intelligence Report The increased use of xylazine as an addition to fentanyl may be due in part to its lower cost and lower risk of law enforcement scrutiny because it is not a controlled substance, he said. But efforts are underway to change that.
In March, a bipartisan group of lawmakers introduced legislation to eliminate illegal xylazine in both the House and Senate.important part of invoiceThe bill, which has been referred to committees in both chambers, would protect xylazine for legal veterinary uses but classify it as a Schedule III controlled substance when used illegally.of American Veterinary Medical Association And that National Association of Attorneys General Both support the bill.
A month after proposing that federal law, the Biden administration designated fentanyl mixed with xylazine as a dangerous substance. new threat.
“As a physician, I am deeply concerned about the devastating effects of the combination drug fentanyl and xylazine,” Dr. Rahul Gupta, director of the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy, said in an April statement. “As President Biden’s drug policy advisor, I am extremely concerned about what this threat means for the country.”
Coincidentally, federal agents in San Diego arrested a middleman who was transporting drugs and cash two days before the White House announcement. According to the criminal complaint in his case, Homeland Security Investigations agents first began monitoring his movements when a package addressed to him was intercepted at a FedEx facility in San Diego. Investigators say the package contained $19,490 in cash and tested positive for trace amounts of fentanyl.
On April 10, undercover HSI agents tracked a man driving a white Mercedes-Benz SUV from an apartment in downtown San Diego to the Postal Annex store in El Cajon. They surrounded his car outside the facility and arrested him.
When investigators searched the SUV, they found a vacuum-sealed bag containing more than two pounds of a white powdery substance wrapped in multiple layers of packaging. Field tests conducted on the substance yielded positive results for both fentanyl and xylazine, according to the criminal complaint. The plea agreement acknowledges the presence of xylazine, but does not provide details on how or when xylazine was added to the fentanyl.
Federal court records reviewed by the Union-Tribune show at least one case in which law enforcement detected the presence of xylazine in a drug sample. In that case, a man accidentally shot himself in the groin in Logan Heights in March 2022. Responding officers found a belt bag believed to belong to the man containing powdered fentanyl, as well as 834 counterfeit oxycodone pills that a DEA laboratory later confirmed contained fentanyl and xylazine.
He has pleaded not guilty to federal drug charges.
