Colorado: 200,000 Fentanyl Pills Seized in Life-Saving Bust

SWALLOWING DEATH? –

July 6, 2022 – Gov. Jared Polis signed Colorado’s new “fentanyl accountability” bill at a ceremony at the state Capitol in May – the new law provides stricter criminal penalties for the possession of small amounts of fentanyl and other drugs laced with it.

“Every single bust, and I hate to use that term, is making a substantive community impact on the life-saving front,” Besser said. “If it saves one life, for me, it was worth the whole process.”

Fentanyl pills are extremely cheap right now, officials said Wednesday. The drugs can go for as little as $1 and are disguised in flavors like strawberry and raspberry. Drug dealers are now resorting to innovative methods to flood the market with fentanyl-related substances so they can have maximum appeal to unsuspecting users, Besser said.

Fentanyl is being mixed with heroin, cocaine, methamphetamine and illegally produced marijuana. The DEA estimates that 1 kilogram of fentanyl, or 2.2 pounds, can kill up to 500,000 people if lethal doses are ingested.

Fentanyl pills collected in the April and February seizures had the potential to kill as many as 100,000 people in Colorado, Besser said. There are about 6 million people living in Colorado.