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Drug dealer sentenced for deadly overdose in Union County

Trenton Latres Butler, 27, convicted of second-degree murder

UNION COUNTY, N.C. — A “self-admitted drug dealer” will spend two decades in prison after his role in a deadly overdose that happened last March in Union County.

The Union County Sheriff’s Office said Trenton Latres Butler was convicted of second-degree murder, trafficking in opium/heroin, and two counts of possession of a firearm by a felon on Tuesday.

According to the sheriff’s office, Butler sold fentanyl pills to 26-year-old Javier Ramirez-Sanchez in March of 2022. Ramirez-Sanchez died after taking the dose.

Investigators also said that Butler “repeatedly sold pressed fentanyl pills” and a gun to a confidential informant. Authorities searched Butler’s home and found more than 800 pressed fentanyl pills, Tramadol pills, Oxycodone pills, marijuana, and several guns.

On Tuesday, Butler was sentenced to serve between 225 and 282 months in prison and pay a $500,000 fine, according to the sheriff’s office.

Union County District Attorney Trey Robison said his office “will continue to aggressively prosecute fentanyl dealers who are poisoning our community.”

Read the full article on the Opera News website.

After Raleigh man’s overdose, dealer convicted of selling fentanyl-laced drugs

A Durham woman charged with selling drugs containing fentanyl that resulted in the death of a 23-year-old Raleigh man was convicted in federal court Friday.

Carlisa Allen, 46, was convicted on multiple cocaine-related drug charges, including conspiring to distribute a substance containing fentanyl resulting in death and possessing a firearm to further a drug trafficking crime, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Middle District of North Carolina said in a news release.

Allen’s drug trafficking conspiracy resulted in the cocaine and fentanyl overdose death of Joshua Skip Zinner on March 10, the U.S. Attorney’s Office said.

She was convicted after a four-day trial and could face 25 years to life in prison when sentenced on Feb. 13 next year.

Fentanyl overdose reversal spray ‘standing by’ for every public school in Charlotte

With the White House charting action in schools nationwide to curb teen drug use and deaths, Charlotte-Mecklenburg leaders plan to stock opioid overdose-reversal medicine in hallways.

While there have been no documented fatal overdoses in Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools, some data suggests drug use among students is on the rise. Fentanyl — a synthetic opioid — is pervasive in street-bought drugs, experts say.

Naloxone, an overdose-reversal medicine (commonly called Narcan), will be available in every school, pending CMS board approval, Raynard Washington, Mecklenburg health director, told The Charlotte Observer this week.

With the White House charting action in schools nationwide to curb teen drug use and deaths, Charlotte-Mecklenburg leaders plan to stock fentanyl overdose-reversal medicine in hallways.

We are standing by ready to start,” he said.

The Observer first reported on the district’s plan to allow naloxone in schools in September.

‘Not my kid.’ How $7 pills get Charlotte teens hooked on fentanyl

The last bathroom stall on the left. An afternoon math class. The house across the street. This weekend’s party.

Students sent Debbie Dalton letters after she spoke to them about her son, who died after taking a line of fentanyl-laced cocaine in 2016. If schools let her in, she’s one of the only sources of education North Carolina teens get on fentanyl’s dangers.

Fentanyl is easy for teens to get — and, these days, it’s even harder to escape.

After losing his best friend to the very drugs the two of them would use together, one Charlotte teen shared his winding journey from an innocent swig of liquor to a dependency on $7 pills, posing as Percocets, that circulated through his school.

“I didn’t know who I was,” said 17-year-old Dylan Krebs, remembering the height of his addiction. “I had completely forgotten everything about me.”

Not only could he not help himself then, he says, but his parents and teachers seemed to have no idea. He says students sold illegal painkillers in classrooms and recalls only once a teacher at school warning teens of the dangers of drugs.

“Everything is laced,” officials have long warned, and one fentanyl pill — about 2 milligrams — with the potent opioid is enough to kill a person.

Deputies charge Newport woman with Hubert drug death

ONSLOW COUNTY, N.C. (WITN) – A woman is accused by deputies of providing the drugs that led to the death of a man earlier this year here in the east.

The Onslow County Sheriff’s Office said that Destiny Smith, 23, of Newport, was arrested November 2nd and charged with death by distribution of controlled substances.

It was back on January 13th that deputies responded to a home on Turtle Cove Boulevard in Hubert and found 46-year-old James Strickland dead.

Investigators said it was revealed that Smith provided the victim with drugs that tested positive for Fentanyl.

Officials said an autopsy revealed that Strickland died from fentanyl and ethanol toxicity.

Smith is being held in the Onslow County Detention Center under a $100,000 secured bond.

Read the article on the WITN web site.

Chapel Hill company working to develop vaccine to prevent fentanyl overdoses

After more than 4,000 people in North Carolina died last year from fentanyl, a Chapel Hill company has a plan to cut down on deadly overdoses.

A Chapel Hill company is developing an injectable drug to cut down on deadly overdoses after more than 4,000 people in North Carolina died last year from fentanyl.

Fentanyl is the number one killer of Americans ages 18 to 45, with opioids producing the worst drug crisis in the history of the United States.

Chapel Hill-based Cessation Therapeutics says its monoclonal antibody therapy, called CSX-1004, can block the dangerous effects of fentanyl.

“Fentanyl can get to the brain really quickly,” said Andy Barrett, chief scientific officer for Cessation Therapeutics. “And the brain is where it produces its pleasurable effects and its dangerous respiratory depression.”

Without any intervention, fentanyl can enter the bloodstream and travel easily to the brain – but the monoclonal antibody can bind to fentanyl in the blood and prevent it from crossing that blood brain barrier.

“It would block all of the effects of fentanyl for at least a month,” Barrett said.

Local mother makes it her mission to spread awareness about illicit fentanyl

Allen Michael “Mikey” Boyd had a “heart of gold” and loved interacting with people with Intellectual/Developmental Disabilities. He was a “beautiful soul with a free spirit” who loved his younger brothers, spending time with friends and skateboarding, his mother, Allena Hale, shares with groups of people she meets at events that raise awareness about the dangers of illicit fentanyl use.

Hale, of Pamlico Beach, lost Boyd to fentanyl poisoning on March 31, 2022 when he was just 22 years old.

Through her work, she hopes to educate people and comfort grieving families who have similar stories of young family members that were kind, smart and funny but met untimely deaths.

What is Fentanyl?

Fentanyl is a synthetic opioid that is 50 to 100 times more potent than morphine, according to the National Institute on Drug Abuse. Pharmaceutical-grade fentanyl is used by medical professionals to treat patients with severe pain, and is used to treat patients with chronic pain who are “physically more tolerant to other opioids.”

When fentanyl is produced illegally, it is dropped on blotter paper, smoked, snorted/sniffed or made into pills that look similar to other opioids, per the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA).

Vance & Adjacent Counties Fentvic Meetup #7 on 11/5/23

FENTANYL VICTIMS’ FAMILIES ORGANIZE TO FIGHT ILLICIT FENTANYL IN NC!

Fentvic Meetup #7 for Vance & Adjacent Counties NC (open to the public)

Date	Sunday, November 5, from 2-4PM
Location	Pentecostal Holiness Church 621 US-158 Bypass Henderson NC 27536

Download Press Release PDF

NC OCME Reports Updated

Fentvic has recieved updated reports from the North Carolina Office of Chief Medical Examiner (OCME). Latest reports can be found here on the Fentvic website.

There were 266 fentanyl-positive deaths in July 2023 compared to 251 in July 2022. Year to date, there is a 6% increase (2,045) compared to this time last year, January to July 2022 (1,926).

Data Source: NC OCME Toxicology data; NC OCME Toxicology is nationally accredited by the American Board of Forensic Toxicology, Inc. NC OCME Toxicology provides forensic analytical testing of specimens for all 100 counties of the statewide medical examiner system. Toxicology results are based on blood, vitreous fluid, or other specimens used for testing at the discretion of the pathologist and/or toxicologist. For additional information regarding these reports, please contact ocme.data.request@dhhs.nc.gov

The latest college campus freebies? Naloxone and fentanyl test strips

At the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, three students stand behind a card table covered in naloxone injection kits. When a curious student leans in and asks what the kits are for, Caroline Clodfelter, one of the co-founders of the student group running the table, explains: “It will reverse an opioid overdose. … So let’s say you’re going out to a frat — stick it in your pocket. It’s easy to just have on you.”

Nearly 600 miles away, at the State University of New York’s Delhi campus, Rebecca Harrington, who works in student affairs, has also been tabling to prevent fentanyl overdoses. Her table, though, is full of colorful cups, a water jug and candies in zip-close bags — tools for her demonstration on how to use a fentanyl test strip. These test strips allow students to see whether a pill has been laced with the deadly synthetic opioid.

Test strips and naloxone are becoming more and more common on college campuses, and at least one health department has recommended they be added to school packing lists. For students who didn’t bring their own, many campuses are handing them out at welcome fairs, orientation events or campus health centers.

As more teens overdose on fentanyl, schools face a drug crisis unlike any other
Fentanyl was involved in the vast majority of teen overdose deaths in 2021, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Nearly a quarter of those deaths involved counterfeit pills that weren’t prescribed by a doctor. And the problem has been following teens onto college campuses.

Students may think they’re taking pills like oxycodone, Xanax or Vicodin. Instead, those pills often have fentanyl in them, resulting in overdoses on campuses across the U.S., from Ohio to Colorado to Oregon. At UNC-Chapel Hill, three students died from fentanyl poisoning in just the last two years.