Recent Drug Arrests Highlight Fentanyl’s Rise in North Texas

Last week, a man arrested for dealing hundreds of pills laced with fentanyl was federally charged with possession and intent to distribute the lethal synthetic opioid, according to Leigha Simonton, the U.S. attorney for the Northern District of Texas.

Richard Daniel Gomez, 22, was arrested on Jan. 26 when he allegedly acted as a courier for a $15,000 cash transaction consisting of 6,000 “blues” believed to be illicitly manufactured drugs, possibly oxycodone, laced with fentanyl, a Justice Department news release stated. Gomez met the undercover agent on Turtle Creek Boulevard in Dallas, where he was arrested immediately following the completion of the deal.

According to the arrest affidavit, the vacuum-sealed package containing the pills weighed 668 grams, or nearly 1.5 pounds, meaning that Gomez faces 10 years to life in prison if convicted.

Gomez’s arrest came a week after Simonton announced the arrest of two men in Fort Worth on fentanyl-related drug charges. Leeroy Marquee Jones, aka Aladdin, 32, and Christopher Antwuan George, 21, allegedly ran a drug-trafficking operation that “dealt fentanyl, cocaine, heroin, methamphetamine and marijuana in Fort Worth’s ‘Stop 6’ neighborhood” on the southeast side of  the city, a press release noted at the time.

On Jan. 19, authorities seized 500 grams of suspected fentanyl along with 400 grams of suspected methamphetamine, firearms and “a large amount of U.S. currency,” according to the release. Like Gomez, both Jones and George face 10 years to life in federal prison if convicted.

These recent arrests bring attention to a continuing problem that fentanyl continues to present throughout North Texas.

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These recent arrests bring attention to an increasing problem that fentanyl presents throughout North Texas. Fentanyl is 50–100 times more potent than morphine, according to the Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA). In October 2022, the Dallas County Southwestern Institute of Forensic Sciences released a study that detailed a “an increase in identifications of fentanyl, fentanyl analogs, and heroin, among other opioids, in the toxicology and seized drug analysis fields over the past several years.”

In December 2022, Fox 4 reported that Dallas Police Chief Eddie Garcia claimed “his officers seized enough fentanyl to potentially kill thousands of people” last year. The report also stated that “DPD has linked dozens of overdose deaths to the illicit substance that they’re finding laced in other pills.”

An increased amount of resources on a local level are being deployed to combat fentanyl. Two DPD detectives are now dedicated to investigating overdoses and deaths suspected to be related to fentanyl, and Dallas Fire-Rescue has begun a new partnership with the Recovery Resource Council to administer Narcan, a drug that can reverse overdoses, to those who have overdosed on opioids, utilizing a full-time paramedic.

One of the bills that state Sen. Nathan Johnson (D-Dallas) hopes to push through this year is directly tied to the rise in fentanyl-related deaths in Texas. As detailed in the filing, Senate Bill 86 aims to legalize “the use, possession, delivery, or manufacture of testing equipment that identifies the presence of fentanyl, alpha-methylfentanyl, or any other derivative or controlled substance analogue of fentanyl.”

The low-cost strips are designed to help drug users determine if fentanyl has been mixed with their drugs. They are currently classified as drug paraphernalia under state law, making them illegal. Johnson’s bill is similar to one filed in the Texas House last year by another Dallas lawmaker, Jasmine Crockett, now a member of the U.S. House of Representatives, that failed to make it to the floor. Johnson’s bill is co-authored by Republican Sen. Bob Hall; Gov. Greg Abbott has recently expressed support for the idea of legalizing the test strips.

The fact that measures addressing fentanyl-related deaths have begun to receive bipartisan support from state lawmakers suggests the topic is perhaps troubling enough to transcend typical party politics. After the first week of this current legislative session in Austin, Sen. Johnson told the Observer he sees great value in an action like legalizing fentanyl test strips, even in a Republican-controlled state government.

“This bill addresses drug overdoses, a very sad problem,” he said. “Fentanyl kills a lot of young people and this will help to change that.”