'It Is Personal': U.S. Attorney For Colorado Shares New Initiative To Fight Fentanyl
DENVER (CBS4) - The number of deadly drug cases involving fentanyl in which law enforcement agencies across Colorado are being called to investigate is increasing. With those investigations, more dealers linked to overdose deaths are also being held accountable in federal court.
Cole Finegan, the United States Attorney for the District of Colorado, says their office has a new initiative focused on combating fentanyl.
As a father, Finegan has seen the impacts of fentanyl, close to his own family.
"There was a boy who grew up with my son. They were inseparable at one period in their lives, and that young man overdosed on fentanyl at 32," he said.
"It is personal in that regard when you see it," he said.
Through his work as the United States Attorney, he is watching and trying to stop that same drug from lurking in our communities.
"We are taking dead aim at those criminals and our intent is to use every possible tool we have under the federal law to prosecute those people and stop them from what they are doing," he said.
Such efforts have been carried out in different communities recently. In just the last few months, two cases have made headlines. Dealers are now facing federal charges for the death of someone linked to their fentanyl-laced drugs.
Alexis Wilkins is charged for the death of a teenage girl who overdosed in class in Colorado Springs, and more recently Maria Cecilia Davis-Conchie, who is one of three dealers, now blamed for the death of her own 16-year-old son.
While U.S. Attorney Finegan couldn't talk specifically about any one case. He says his office is using every tool they have to try and stop this public health crisis.
"We are dealing in a whole new world here. That's why all of us in law enforcement are doing our best to move as fast we can to try and put an end to it," he said.
"Can we stop this?" CBS4 reporter Karen Morfitt asked.
"We have to. We really don't have a choice. Our job again as I said, our job in the U.S. Attorney's Office is to do everything we can every day to protect the safety of the citizens of the United States and the citizens of this community that's our job we have to do our best to stop it," he said.