BUSTED

California Law Enforcement Finds 15 Pounds of Fentanyl and $139,000 in Cash Outside an Oakland High School

Law enforcement seized 15 pounds of fentanyl and $139,000 in cash from a car outside of a high school in Oakland, California, a region that has been battered by the opioid crisis.

Officials found 15 pounds of fentanyl and $139,000 in cash in a car parked at McClymond High School in Oakland, CA, the latest in a series of drug busts in the county. None of the four suspects in custody are students. The suspected dealers could, however, face additional charges for being within 1,000 feet of a school. Law enforcement believes they may have chosen the location to “have more cover to blend in.” Fentanyl, an opioid that is up to 50 times stronger than heroin, has flooded Northern California and the country as a whole—in 2021, nationwide drug overdoses hit an all-time high due in part to fentanyl, which is often mixed into drugs without users’ knowledge. A spokesman for the local narcotics task force said that there are “a tremendous amount of people addicted” to fentanyl in the region, making it a microcosm of the national crisis.