An Arizona Department of Public Safety trooper seized nearly 230 pounds of fentanyl pills on June 2 during a traffic stop in southern Arizona.
During the vehicle search, the trooper reported finding more than 1 million fentanyl pills that weighed nearly 230 pounds and nearly 10 pounds of cocaine hidden inside.
The drugs found had an estimated street value of $3.1 million in the Phoenix area, according to the department.
The car’s driver, 27-year-old Fernando Alfonso-Fernandez, was allegedly trying to smuggle the drugs from Sonora, Mexico, to Phoenix.
Dangerous and Deadly
The arrest comes after the House passed a bill, 289-133, on May 25 that would classify all fentanyl as schedule I substances—those that are the most dangerous and deadly.The Biden administration last week also imposed sanctions on 17 people and organizations it says are distributing equipment used in the production of illicit pills that frequently include fentanyl. The move by the administration targeted organizations and people in China and Mexico.
Fentanyl Crisis
Fentanyl is a synthetic opioid painkiller that is 50 times more potent than heroin and 100 times more potent than morphine, according to the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration.Fentanyl is also often laced with other drugs, resulting in users unknowingly consuming it, leading to dangerous situations of addiction or overdose, leading to death. Drug traffickers lace fentanyl in other drugs like cocaine, heroin, and prescription drugs.
“Fentanyl is the single deadliest drug threat our nation has ever encountered,” USDEA Administrator Anne Milgram said in a statement.
“Fentanyl is everywhere. No community is safe from this poison, from large metropolitan areas to rural America. We must take every opportunity to spread the word to prevent fentanyl-related overdose death and poisonings from claiming scores of American lives every day.”
Most of the illegal fentanyl in America is made in Mexico from substances and precursors that come from China.
Some lawmakers believe education and rehab are suitable approaches to helping stop the fentanyl crisis. But many people dying are not addicted to drugs—they are experimenting with recreational drug use.
Many families whose loved ones have died of a fentanyl overdose refer to their deaths as poisonings, as many have died taking a counterfeit prescription pill not knowing it contained a lethal dose of fentanyl.
According to data released by the U.S. Department of Justice, 107,735 people in the U.S. died from drug overdoses from August 2021 to August 2022, with two-thirds involving synthetic opioids, primarily fentanyl.
Between 2019 and 2021, fatal overdoses nationwide increased by about 94 percent, with an estimated 196 Americans dying daily from fentanyl poisoning.
The U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency announced a record-breaking seizure of more than 379 million deadly doses of fentanyl nationwide in 2022.
Fentanyl and other opioids are fueling the worst drug crisis in the history of the United States. More than 1,500 people per week die from taking some type of opioid, according to the National Center for Health Statistics, making opioids by far the leading cause of fatal overdoses in the country.
Fentanyl was first synthesized in 1959. It began to be used for medical purposes in 1968. Fentanyl is legally made and distributed in the United States.
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