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Police Avert ‘250,000 Potential Death Sentences’ With Massive Fentanyl Bust

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Steve Birr Vice Reporter
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Authorities in Pennsylvania seized enough heroin and fentanyl to cause a quarter million people to fatally overdose during a raid Sunday evening.

Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro announced the drug seizure Tuesday along with the arrests of 24-year-old Cesar Guzman and 30-year-old Duagermy Sanchez-Rosario. The arrests came in the wake of a month-long investigation into drug distribution operations in Philadelphia, which lost an estimated 1,200 residents to opioid-related overdoses last year, reports WPVI.

The total haul of heroin and fentanyl seized in the bust carries an estimated street value of roughly $2.6 million. Guzman and Sanchez-Rosario face a number of charges including drug possession and conspiracy.

“Putting the dollar value of these narcotics aside, the amount of drugs we seized would have created 250,000 doses of heroin and fentanyl,” Shapiro said Tuesday, according to WPVI. “That’s 250,000 potential death sentences averted.”

Narcotics continue to pour into due to the relentless efforts of drug cartels trying to take advantage of America’s debilitating opioid epidemic. Authorities in Boston recently scored one of the largest drug busts in Massachusetts’ history, seizing enough fentanyl to cause seven million fatal overdoses.

The massive grab was the result of a six month wiretap investigation dubbed “Operation High Hopes,” that monitored a gang in the Boston area with links to the Sinaloa Cartel in Mexico. Boston police and agents with the Drug Enforcement Administration arrested 38 suspected narcotics traffickers in the bust that yielded more than 33 pounds of fentanyl, as well as cocaine, heroin, $300,000 in cash and two firearms.

Authorities in Pennsylvania seized enough heroin and fentanyl to cause a quarter million people to fatally overdose during a raid Sunday evening.

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Fentanyl overtook heroin as the deadliest substance in the U.S. in 2016, claiming 19,413 lives in 2017, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The substance is fueling more overdose deaths as drug dealers increasingly cut the substance into heroin and cocaine supplies to maximize profits.

Nationally, drug overdoses are now the leading cause of accidental death for Americans under age 50, killing more than 64,000 people in 2016.

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