US Judge Orders Chinese Drug Cartel Pay $18 Million For Fentanyl Death of Ohio Man

Judge breaks new ground in ruling against Zheng drug cartel who sent fentanyl from China that resulted in the death of a 37-year-old Akron man.

A display of the fentanyl and meth that was seized by U.S. Customs and Border Protection officers at the Nogales Port of Entry during a press conference in Nogales, Ariz., on Jan. 31, 2019. Mamta Popat/Arizona Daily Star via AP

A judge in a court in Ohio broke new ground and employed a new tool in the U.S.’s legal and government response to the deadly illicit fentanyl epidemic with her Aug. 9 ruling that a Chinese drug cartel pay $18 million to the family of a man who fatally overdosed on the drug that officials tracked back to the cartel.

Thomas “Tommy” Rauh was 37 years old and battling addiction when he injected a lethal combination of heroin laced with fentanyl, a synthetic opioid, in 2015.