CALIFORNIA, USA — Prosecutors have a relatively new tool in their arsenal when it comes to the war on fentanyl: murder charges.
In July, a drug dealer was convicted of second-degree murder for the fentanyl-related death of a 15-year-old Roseville girl.
ABC10 takes a closer look at the process of making a case against a fentanyl dealer in court.
Fentanyl is a crisis that’s not going away, according to Sacramento County District Attorney Thien Ho.
“This is an unprecedented epidemic and crisis of monumental public safety concerns,” said Ho.
It’s a fight that Thien Ho said he is all too familiar with.
“We’ve had nearly 400 people in Sacramento County die from fentanyl poisoning in the last three years. That’s more than all the gun-related homicides in that same period,” said Ho.
Ho is joining a growing number of prosecutors across the state making it their mission to stop the dangerous drug at the source by handing down the harshest punishment to dealers, a murder charge.
In July he filed murder charges against a Rancho Cordova man who investigators said sold a deadly dose of fentanyl to a 26-year-old Folsom woman. This charge is a first for Sacramento County.
“We will continue to hold these individuals accountable to the fullest extent of the law,” said Ho.
But holding dealers accountable can be very difficult and it starts at the crime scene.
“The first thing we do is we test the suspected drugs to make sure it's fentanyl,” said Ho.
When the evidence gets to the Sacramento County Crime Lab, Dani Gray is one of the many criminalists who performs tests.
“We’re going to do a color test,” said Gray.
Gray said said during her career at the lab, the types of cases have changed significantly.
“When I first started this job the majority of my cases were methamphetamine. As we’ve gone on, especially through the pandemic, almost every other case has fentanyl,” said Gray.
Gray showed ABC10 the wide range of items that come in for testing, including a kilogram of fentanyl.
“It's 500,000 lethal doses of fentanyl within this 1,000 grams, it would be more than enough to kill the population of Sacramento," Gray said.
The lab also receives a variety of pills for testing. Each pill is charted, vividly described, and one of each type is tested.
Kristel Suchland is the supervising criminalist for the drug section of the lab. She said the tedious process of testing for fentanyl is becoming the new norm.
“In 2019, we had fewer than 20 cases that we saw come through the lab. Last year we had over 450 cases that contain fentanyl,” said Suchland.
And the cases continue to pile up.
“Honestly, we have a huge backlog of drugs so it’s hard to keep up with what they are bringing in now and they are only getting 5 to 10% at most off the street,” said Suchland.
Time is of the essence when it comes to making a case.
“Because the evidence is going to be gone a lot of time the drug dealers are using social media whether it’s Snapchat, Instagram, Facebook and so that information can disappear, be deleted or removed,” said Ho. “Search through the victim’s phone to find out who provided it and who sold it to her.”
The number one goal of the district attorney’s office when it comes to processing evidence is to prove intent. Prove that the person who gave the drugs to the victim knew what they were doing.
“We have to show actual knowledge — knowledge that they’re selling fentanyl and knowledge that they know that it is dangerous. Those two elements are sometimes difficult to prove,” said Ho.
The key, Ho said, is to prosecute fentanyl cases like they would for Driving Under the Influence.
State law requires a judge to warn people convicted of driving under the influence that they are endangering lives and if they continue down this path and kill someone, they could face a harsher punishment.
Senate Bill 44, also known as Alexandra’s law, would have required judges to do the same for fentanyl cases, but it failed in committee last year. Republicans are now trying to revive the bill. There was a discussion in the legislature on September 5th.
“Since this particular idea didn’t pass the legislature I've instructed my attorneys to go ahead and give that advisement on all cases where somebody is possessing drugs or selling drugs,” said Ho.
Whether the drugs are pills, powder, or another substance, the message is if you peddle poison in Sacramento County you will be prosecuted.
“We can hold somebody accountable for murder,” said Ho.
Justice can be slow a process, while fentanyl continues to flood the market.
“We lay 10 pills out in front of you, six of them will kill you. Is that a chance you are willing to take?” said Suchland.
The district attorney’s office is working on a new rapid response task force combining the Sacramento County Sheriff’s Office, Homeland Security, and the Drug Enforcement Agency. Training will begin soon.
Watch more on ABC10
