At least 46 accused fentanyl dealers charged with murder in Texas

At least 46 people in the Lone Star State have been charged with murder for allegedly administering lethal doses of fentanyl to others, Texas lawmakers say. Fentanyl is a drug that has crossed the border under the watch of President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris.

That number was highlighted when lawmakers were updated Monday on House Bill 6, which takes effect in September 2023, KVUE reported.

The article continued:

HB 6 would allow prosecutors to charge anyone who makes or traffics fentanyl with murder. It would also classify every fentanyl-related death in Texas as a “poisoning” on a death certificate instead of an “overdose.”

Lawmakers and advocates have said they made the latest change because the term “overdose” carries a stigma and most people who die after taking fentanyl don’t know it was in the drugs they took.

The Republican National Committee reported in June that about 30.3 tons of fentanyl had crossed the country’s southern border since Biden took office, Breitbart News reported. That amount, the committee said, is enough to kill about 13.8 billion people.

In March, a Texas family was devastated to learn that one of their relatives, a high school student, had died of suspected fentanyl poisoning after making “one mistake,” Breitbart News reported.

A family member said, “Fentanyl is out there, and it doesn’t look like fentanyl. It’s a real problem. It has no demographic. It doesn’t matter what your background is. It doesn’t matter if you have good parents. It’s out there, and it’s a danger. And it’s taking children.”

U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) officers at the El Paso border crossing have intercepted 5 kilograms of fentanyl and 51 kilograms of cocaine bound for the U.S. drug market after a week of seizures, Breitbart News reported in May:

In most cases, Mexican cartels’ cross-border drug smuggling is focused on moving the deadly cargo north and away from the border region. The impact of fentanyl overdoses is a nationwide problem. In El Paso County, the latest annual coroner’s report (2022) shows that there have been nearly 70 fentanyl-related overdoses in El Paso. The deaths occurred after residents of the border city consumed fentanyl alone or other illicit narcotics laced with fentanyl.

According to the KVUE article, officials with the Texas Department of State Health Services say about five Texans die from fentanyl poisoning every day.

“The synthetic opioid, which is up to 50 times more potent than heroin, was responsible for about 45% of all drug-related deaths in Texas in 2023,” the report said.