Growing fentanyl crisis is leaving ‘trail of death’ in its wake, federal officials warn
HARTFORD — As part of a federal investigation into the booming fentanyl and heroin epidemic, U.S. Attorney David K interalia a message to states to keep their nose out of the drug trade.
“We are sending a clear message to states that they cannot interfere with federal law enforcement,” he said at a news conference Thursday.
“The message is that we have to do all we can to control this scourge of heroin and fentanyl and we have to stop the flow.”
The opioid crisis is spreading throughout the country, and it is not just heroin and crack cocaine on the rise. Heroin and fentanyl are increasingly being mixed into heroin and other drugs, federal officials say.
A recent heroin seizure in Massachusetts’s Berkshires revealed that the drug is often mixed with other substances including fentanyl, according to a report by state officials and the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Massachusetts.
The heroin seized in the state’s Berkshires is one of a small number of known to contain fentanyl, and authorities are asking others to report fentanyl-containing heroin they find.
In a recent statewide raid in Vermont, the state Attorney General’s Office seized cocaine, fentanyl and a handful of pills containing an unknown amount of methamphetamine, some of it mixed with fentanyl, according to a report by Vermont State Police.
In a search of the home of a narcotics investigator in Connecticut, police found a pound of heroin and fentanyl mixed with cocaine, according to a report by the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Connecticut.
“Heroin, fentanyl and other opiates are being mixed with fentanyl and with methamphetamine,” James O. Brown, special agent-in-charge of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration’s Hartford Field Division said Thursday during a news conference in Hartford.
The drugs in Vermont and Connecticut are considered to be heroin and fentanyl mixed with other substances, and officials believe they are the