Dealers who sell fentanyl-laced drugs that result in death can face murder charges under tough new policies announced by Orange County District Attorney Todd Spitzer and Riverside County District Attorney Mike Hestrin on Monday, Nov. 9. “We have seen a 1,000% increase over the last five years as a result of overdoses and deaths by fentanyl,” Spitzer said. “Rich, poor, Black, White, Brown, men, women, children, hardcore drug users and first-time drug users who are exposed have died.”
Spitzer will add an admonishment to plea deals, in which dealers acknowledge that fentanyl is in street drugs and can be deadly. If that dealer is involved in another fentanyl sale that results in death, second-degree murder charges can be filed. In Riverside County, Hestrin is prosecuting seven second-degree murder cases against alleged pill pushers on the theory of implied malice, and has several more in the pipeline. The San Bernardino County District Attorney’s Office filed its first murder case against an alleged fentanyl dealer in July.
But Los Angeles County District Attorney George Gascon will not be joining his colleagues in a crackdown. “We have been down this road before: we know that increased penalties for drug offenses do not save lives,” said Alex Bastian, a special adviser to Gascón. “Over the last three decades as we increased penalties, drugs became more potent, cheaper and easier to access. We need to learn from the failed strategies of the past, in order to find solutions for the future.”
