Four individuals from South Florida have been handed prison sentences for their roles in distributing lethal drugs, including fentanyl and methamphetamine. According to a press release by the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Florida, Gito St Fort, Anwar Hazzi, Samantha Yi, and Darnell Julio Mendez faced justice for their distribution of controlled substances that led to fatal and near-fatal overdoses.
St Fort, who has a past dotted with criminal activity, received a 320-month sentence on Thursday after pleading guilty to his role in a death caused by the drugs he distributed. Details obtained by the U.S. Attorney’s Office revealed on December 24, 2023, St Fort sold fentanyl to a victim who tragically overdosed while visiting with family. Hazzi received a 200-month sentence on Jan. 15 for selling significant quantities of drugs, concealed as counterfeit prescription pills, over a nearly year-long period.
In a related case on Wednesday, Samantha Yi was sentenced to 288 months after she and her boyfriend, Mendez, provided fentanyl to a mother whose infant fatally overdosed on the drug. Mendez, already with a criminal history, was sentenced earlier to 360 months. These sentences underscore the gravity of the opioid epidemic’s stranglehold on communities across the nation, with synthetic opioids like fentanyl claiming lives indiscriminately…