Authorities executing a search warrant arrested six people and reported seizing more than 4 ounces of heroin laced with deadly fentanyl, police said Friday.
Texas City police and the Galveston County Organized Crime Task Force executed the narcotics search warrant Thursday in the 5800 block of Mentor Drive in Texas City, police spokesman officer Lorenzo Manuel de la Garza said.
Along with the fentanyl, police reported seizing about 67.1 grams of cocaine, 13 grams of methamphetamine and 8.8 ounces of marijuana, de la Garza said.
Six people were arrested, and transported to the Galveston County Jail where they were charged, de la Garza said.
• Bobby Earl Meeks, 46, was charged with three counts of manufacturing and delivery of a controlled substance with bond set at $1.5 million.
• Gaston Charles, 55, was charged with possession of a controlled substance with a $150,000 bond.
• Angelia Dodson, 58, was charged with possession of a controlled substance and also held on a theft of service warrant with a $21,500 bond.
• Ingrid Lopez, 39, was charged with possession of a controlled substance with a $100,000 bond.
• Corey Allen Simon, 46, was charged with possession with marijuana and unlawful possession of firearm by felon with a $250,000 bond.
• Gilbert Castille was charged with possession of marijuana with a $100,000 bond.
Galveston County in 2020 had the second highest number of drug overdose deaths in the state of Texas, roughly 200 per 100,000, according to the Texas Department of State Health Services.
More than half of those were attributed to the synthetic opioid fentanyl, officials have said.
Two milligrams of fentanyl, which is equal to 15 grains of table salt, could be a lethal dose, according to the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration.
On Christmas Day in Galveston, Vadim Birca, 31, a citizen of Moldova, and Dimitrije Gudovski, 34, a citizen of Serbia, died just two miles apart in the same hour, of suspected overdose from cocaine laced with fentanyl.
The deaths, and many others, led to a wave of community meetings meant to educate and arm people in the fight against overdose deaths.
Sudden fentanyl overdoses are happening each day across the nation, Dr. Kathryn A. Cunningham, a professor of Pharmacology, vice chairman in the department of Pharmacology and Toxicology and director of the Center for Addiction Research at the University of Texas Medical Branch, told The Daily News shortly after the deaths.
