NC girl found dead from fentanyl overdose, 2 arrested for giving her drugs
After a girl died of fentanyl overdose in September, Gaston County law enforcement began investigating how the juvenile obtained the laced pills that killed her.
Now, a 19-year-old and a 24-year old are charged with death by distribution.
Death by distribution is a felony charge in North Carolina in cases where someone sells an illegal drug to someone who dies in an overdose. It was signed into law by the North Carolina legislature in 2019 and carries a maximum sentence of nearly 20 years in prison.
But use of death by distribution criminal charges have been limited, an investigation by The Charlotte Observer earlier this year showed.
Only six cases out of 86 people charged with death by distribution in North Carolina in the last three years have reached a verdict, with the rest pending. Five of the six saw guilty verdicts. In the sixth case, the person charged pleaded guilty to a lesser crime, according to an analysis by the Observer.
Child fentanyl overdose in Gaston County
On Sept. 26 just before 7 a.m., officers with the Gaston County Police Department found an unconscious juvenile at a location on Kiser Road, near Bessemer City. That’s about 10 minutes from Gastonia.
Officers suspected then that the juvenile died of a drug overdose, the police department said in a Tuesday news release.
Police determined she died after taking fentanyl laced pills, and they identified two people who are believed to have supplied the drug, the department said.
Nicholas Gage Ivey, 19, of Spindale, and Deontae Jaquise Miller, 24, of Rutherfordton were arrested on Dec. 12, according to the release.
Ivey and Miller are charged with death by distribution, felony conspiracy, and felony conspiracy to sell/deliver schedule II controlled substances, according to the release. Both Miller and Ivey remain in jail and are each held on a $500,000 bond.
Death by distribution in North Carolina
Fentanyl overdose is becoming increasingly common in North Carolina, and fentanyl itself is the most common drug distributed in Charlotte because other drugs are laced with it, Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police officials say.
In 2021 in North Carolina, dying of an overdose was nearly two times more common than dying in a car accident. That’s even when traffic deaths in the state were at an all time 20-year high according to U.S. News and World Report.
There were 3,304 overdose-related deaths in 2021 — the overwhelming majority involved fentanyl — and 1,755 traffic deaths.
When someone overdoses on fentanyl, or any other drug, the person who gave them that drug can be charged with a crime. But, in North Carolina they likely won’t be. Police and court leaders say death by distribution cases are difficult to prosecute.
When the North Carolina legislature passed the law to make death by distribution a crime, their hearts were in the right place but the crime is difficult to prove, Lt. Sean Mitchell of the CMPD vice and narcotics unit told the Observer in a July interview.
To prove someone is responsible for death by distribution, police and prosecutors must show they sold the victim the illegal drug that killed them; the drug was responsible for the victim’s death; and, the victim didn’t have an underlying medical condition triggered by the drug, according to the law.
Death by distribution differs from a murder charge. With murder, there has to be actual malice — meaning someone wanted to kill someone. With death by distribution, the lesser charge, prosecutors need to show there was no malice.
