Fentanyl - Chemical Weapons Attack
Dangers of illicit fentanyl Trafficking
The word is only slowly getting out in media circles about the dangers of illicit fentanyl trafficking.
In the 2019 The New York Times Magazine story “The China Connection: How a DEA Agent Cracked a Global Fentanyl Ring,” author Alex W. Palmer wrote: “A kilogram of fentanyl, purchased for only a few thousand dollars, can be mixed with heroin and made into a couple million dollars’ worth of pills. By contrast, a kilogram of undiluted heroin nets less than $80,000 in profit.”
In a 2020 episode of the National Geographic Television documentary series Trafficked, intrepid journalist Mariana van Zeller traced the fentanyl pipeline that has produced the most devastating drug epidemic in U.S. history. She used anonymous and masked informants to take her a step at a time into the dangerous world of the Mexican drug cartels. Van Zeller and her team witnessed kegs of fentanyl dropped into the ocean off the Mexican coast from international container ships.
History of Fentanyl in America | Trafficked with Mariana van Zeller
They then followed the route the drug traffickers took to get the raw material to low-quality labs where the fake pills and powders were manufactured. The team then shadowed the delivery of the fentanyl through the border patrol after the smugglers coated the drug packages with coffee grinds, mustard and fabric softeners to successfully avoid detection of drug-sniffing patrol dogs.
On the Fox News Channel show Justice with Judge Jeanine, host Jeanine Pirro spoke with former DEA Special Agent Derek Maltz about drug trafficking. He said that fentanyl seizures by the Border Patrol in the El Paso Sector had increased 4,000 per cent since 2018. “In Orange County, it’s been reported that there’s been a 1,000 per cent increase since 2016,” he said. “Then there were 30 deaths a year. Now it’s over 4o0. This is a chemical weapons attack.”
Fox Justice with Jeanine with former DEA Special Agent in Charge Derek Maltz
Author Information
Dan Ouellette is a free-lance journalist and author who has covered a range of topics in his decades long career based in San Francisco and since 1999 a resident of New York City. In California he reported on such stories as the dire work at Oakland’s Highland Hospital Emergency Room and how the building of a jazz club in Oakland helped the city resurrect a district that had been neglected. He also wrote about the cultural history of the Volkswagen Beetle that grew into a book on its history, its social impact and its new life as the New Beetle in 1998 (The Volkswagen Beetle Book). In New York, Ouellette largely turned his attention to the jazz scene of the city and international festivals. He was a writer, editor and teacher at City College. He wrote two biographies, Ron Carter: Finding the Right Notes (a story about jazz’s greatest bass player), and Bruce Lundvall: Playing by Ear (about the one of the music industry’s most brilliant ears for signing star artists ranging from Herbie Hancock to Norah Jones). In addition to contributing to different magazines and online publications, Ouellette produces a monthly music column, Jazz & Beyond Intel, on his website: danouellette.net. He can be reached at danouell33@gmail.com.
