Fentanyl-laced pills led to fatal overdose in Georgia, feds say. Dealer gets prison
A Georgia man convicted of selling fake pills laced with fentanyl will spend more than a decade in prison, federal prosecutors said.
Hubert Nathans, 33, was sentenced to 12 years in prison and 15 years of supervised release on Tuesday, Nov. 22, after prosecutors said he sold fake Roxicodone pills to several people in Roswell, a city about 20 miles north of Atlanta, from 2017-18.
One person died, and a second suffered a near-fatal overdose, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Georgia. Nathans’ supplier, Edward Culton, was sentenced to prison earlier this year, prosecutors said.
The judgment comes more than four years after Nathans was convicted on charges of conspiring to distribute and possessing fentanyl that caused at least two overdoses, according to federal officials. Roswell police launched an investigation in 2017 after reports that he was selling the synthetic opioid.
Both Nathans and Culton were arrested on Feb. 15, 2018, and a raid of Culton’s high-rise apartment turned up nearly 1,000 pills laced with fentanyl, prosecutors said. During their investigation, authorities learned Nathans had sold the pills supplied by Culton to a 24-year-old buyer, who overdosed and died in October 2017.
He continued dealing the drugs even after the deadly overdose. Three months later, prosecutors said he sold to a 30-year-old buyer “who also would have died had she not received emergency treatment.”
“Nathans and Culton remorselessly sought to profit from drug addiction at any cost,” U.S. Attorney Ryan K. Buchanan said in a statement. “Their greed resulted in the tragic death of one person and the near-death of another.”
“As the opioid epidemic continues to rage nationwide, these significant sentences should make clear that opioid suppliers and dealers will be held accountable for the devastation they wreak in our communities,” Buchanan said.
A judge sentenced Culton, 29, to 18 years and three months in prison followed by five years of supervised release.