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Tag: Drug Enforcement Administration

  • Justice Department sues pharmaceutical company for allegedly failing to report suspicious opioid sales | CNN Politics

    Justice Department sues pharmaceutical company for allegedly failing to report suspicious opioid sales | CNN Politics

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    Washington
    CNN
     — 

    The Justice Department on Thursday alleged that the AmerisourceBergen Corporation, one of the country’s largest pharmaceutical distributors, and two of its subsidiaries failed to report hundreds of thousands of suspicious prescription opioid orders to pharmacies across the country.

    The lawsuit, which spans several states, alleges that AmerisourceBergen disregarded its legal obligation to report orders of controlled substances to the Drug Enforcement Agency for nearly a decade. The company ignored “red flags” that pharmacies in West Virginia, New Jersey, Colorado and Florida were diverting opioids into illegal drug markets, the suit says.

    “The Department of Justice is committed to holding accountable those who fueled the opioid crisis by flouting the law,” Associate Attorney General Vanita Gupta said in a statement Thursday.

    “Companies distributing opioids are required to report suspicious orders to federal law enforcement. Our complaint alleges that AmerisourceBergen – which sold billions of units of prescription opioids over the past decade – repeatedly failed to comply with that requirement,” she added.

    If AmerisourceBergen is found liable at trial, the company faces billions of dollars in financial penalties, the Justice Department said.

    Lauren Esposito, a spokesperson for AmerisourceBergen, countered on Thursday in a statement that said the Justice Department’s complaint rested on “five pharmacies that were cherry picked out of the tens of thousands of pharmacies that use AmerisourceBergen as their wholesale distributor, while ignoring the absence of action from former administrators at the Drug Enforcement Administration – the DOJ’s own agency.”

    She added: “With the vast quantity of information that AmerisourceBergen shared directly with the DEA with regards to these five pharmacies, the DEA still did not feel the need to take swift action itself – in fact, AmerisourceBergen terminated relationships with four of them before DEA ever took any enforcement action while two of the five pharmacies maintain their DEA controlled substance registration to this day.”

    Yet AmerisourceBergen was allegedly aware that in two of the pharmacies, drugs it distributed were likely being sold in parking lots for cash, the Justice Department said. In another pharmacy, the company was allegedly warned that patients likely suffering from addiction were receiving opioids, including some people who later died of a drug overdose.

    The Justice Department also noted in its lawsuit that AmerisourceBergen’s reporting systems for suspicious opioid orders were deeply inadequate, and that the company intentionally changed its reporting systems to reduce the number of orders flagged as suspicious amid the opioid epidemic.

    Even when orders were flagged as suspicious, AmerisourceBergen often didn’t report those orders to the DEA, according to the complaint.

    Opioids are involved in the vast majority of drug overdose deaths, though synthetic opioids – particularly fentanyl – have played an outsized role. Synthetic opioids – excluding methadone – were involved in more than 72,000 overdose deaths in 2021, about two-thirds of all overdose deaths that year and more than triple the number from five years earlier.

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  • Top Justice Department official calls on social media companies to do more as teens die from fentanyl

    Top Justice Department official calls on social media companies to do more as teens die from fentanyl

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    Landen Hausman, a high school sophomore, died in January after buying fentanyl-laced Percocet through a dealer on social media. His family found him collapsed on the bathroom floor and tried to revive him with CPR, but it was too late. 

    “Sometimes with fentanyl you don’t get a second chance,” his father Marc Hausman told CBS News. 

    Hausman said his son probably did not recognize that counterfeit Percocet could be laced with fentanyl. 

    “He basically bought two of these counterfeit Percocet pills,” Hausman said. “He took one. One killed him. We found the other one [in his bedroom].” 

    Sadly, Landen’s story is all too common. Last year, more than 100,000 Americans died from fentanyl — more deaths than there were of Americans killed in the wars in Vietnam, Afghanistan and Iraq combined. Deaths among teens have more than tripled since 2019. 

    The Drug Enforcement Administration says it is investigating more than 120 cases that involve social media. The agency has issued a warning about emoji code language dealers use to target young buyers. 

    Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco, who oversees the DEA, says fentanyl is the agency’s top priority. 

    “No longer are we talking about meeting on the street and making that connection,” Monaco told CBS News. “The dealer is in your kid’s pocket along with the phone.” 

    Monaco said many who die “are unsuspecting users thinking they’re getting one thing and they’re getting something else in the form of fentanyl.” 

    “So those really that’s not actually an overdose,” she said. “That’s a poisoning.” 

    Monaco also said the Justice Department is pushing social media companies to crack down on dealers, calling the crisis “a national security issue, “a public safety issue” and “a public health issue.” 

    “We’re asking them to do more,” she said. “They need to do more. They need to be policing their platforms. … They need to use, quite frankly, the same tools and the technology that allows them to exquisitely serve up those ads for all sorts of things that we’re buying online and identify those drug dealers and getting them off.” 

    The dealer who sold the fake Percocet to Landen is facing federal charges, but for Hausman, just one arrest isn’t enough. 

    “I don’t know who this dealer is. I really don’t care,” he said. “So for me, justice is, I can’t go back and change what happened. But what I can do is try to do everything possible so maybe this doesn’t happen to someone else.” 

    Norah O’Donnell


    Norah O'Donnell

    Norah O’Donnell is the anchor and managing editor of the “CBS Evening News.” She also contributes to “60 Minutes.”

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  • “Rainbow fentanyl” pills found inside Lego container in New York, authorities say

    “Rainbow fentanyl” pills found inside Lego container in New York, authorities say

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    Authorities found thousands of rainbow-colored fentanyl pills hidden inside a Lego box, the Drug Enforcement Administration announced this week. The nighttime bust occurred in Manhattan last week, leading to the arrest of a New Jersey woman. 

    “Rainbow fentanyl is a clear and present danger, and it is here in New York City,” DEA Special Agent in Charge Frank Tarentino said a press release.

    Officials called it the biggest such seizure to date in New York City, and said the drugs were meant for widespread distribution. Federal agents are working to crack down on violent drug cartels in Mexico believed to be trafficking the drugs into the U.S. 

    First reported in February, the rainbow-colored pills have been seized in at least 21 states, DEA Administrator Anne Milgram said last month. While fentanyl is still more commonly disguised as oxycodone or another prescription drug, officials say the rainbow pills are on the rise. 

    “Disguising fentanyl as candy — and concealing it in children’s toys — will never hide the fact that fentanyl is a deadly poison that harms our communities, our families, and our city,” NYPD Commissioner Keechant L. Sewell said in a statement. 

    Investigators said they observed the suspect, 48-year-old Latesha Bush, carrying what appeared to be a black tote bag wrapped around a large object as she entered a vehicle.

    After they stopped the vehicle, law enforcement allegedly found two black tote bags and a yellow Lego container with several brick-shaped packages covered in black tape lying next to the building blocks. Black tape covering one of the packages had been partially opened, exposing the colorful pills inside. 

    rainbow-fentanyl-seized-in-new-york
    According to the DEA, approximately 15,000 candy-colored fentanyl pills were seized in Manhattan — stuffed inside a Lego box.  

    U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration


    There were approximately 15,000 pills, and preliminary testing showed the presence of fentanyl, according to the DEA. Fentanyl is a lab-created opioid drug that can be 50 times more potent than heroin, so even a small amount can lead to fatal overdoses.

    The suspect was arraigned in Manhattan Criminal Court last Friday and bail was set, officials noted in the press release. 

    “This operation alone removed the equivalent of 500,000 lethal doses of fentanyl from circulation in the Empire State,” Tarentino said. “In the same reporting period, DEA seized the equivalent of over 36 million lethal doses nationally.” 

    Two Mexican drug cartels are responsible for the majority of fentanyl in the U.S., according to federal officials: the Sinaloa Cartel and the Jalisco New Generation Cartel. 

    “Those cartels are acting with calculated, deliberate treachery to get fentanyl to the United States and to get people to buy it through fake pills, by hiding it in other drugs, any means that they can take in order to drive addiction and to make money,” Milgram told “CBS Mornings” last month.

    The Department of Justice considers the Jalisco cartel to be “one of the five most dangerous transnational criminal organizations in the world.” The cartel’s leader, Nemesio Oseguera, “El Mencho,” is among the most sought by Mexican and U.S. authorities.

    Michael Roppolo

    Michael Roppolo is a CBS News reporter. He covers a wide variety of topics, including science and technology, crime and justice, and disability rights.

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