Police praised an elementary school pupil for turning in his parents for drug possession after he delivered a suspect package to school last week.
The boy told his elementary school teacher in Kennewick, Washington, that he was afraid to return home, worried about possible consequences, KEPR reported.
The teacher alerted the police, who sent a school resource officer to interview the child in which he reportedly told the officer about his parents’ drug addiction.
Detectives obtained a search warrant and searched the parents’ residence on North Sheppard Place, where they found a kind of fentanyl pill called “Mexis” and other drug-related paraphernalia.
The boy’s parents, Daniel Staton O’Leary, 29, and Jennifer Ann Edwards, also 29, were taken into custody and charged with possession of illegal narcotic drugs.
The parents have made contradicting claims as to whom the drugs really belonged, court documents revealed.
The boy and his younger sibling have been handed over to Child Protective Services.
Teens Arrested for Fentanyl Stash
Police arrested three teens on June 5 at summer school in San Luis, Arizona, for allegedly having more than 3,000 blue M30 pills, also known as fentanyl, which are potentially deadly.
Police have revealed Noemi Hernandez Madrigal and Alexandra Hernandez were the two senior female students involved, who will be tried as adults. A third suspect, whose name was not identified, will be tried as a minor.
The drug has already claimed many lives across the United States.
Lt. Marco Santana of the San Luis Police Department said: “Even half a pill can kill someone. It’s happened before. We’ve had about 19 overdoses just this year alone. We’ve had about 16 in 2018. It’s obviously a very dangerous drug, and there’s no control.”
Santana went on to paint a grim future for the apprehended teenagers, who were to go on trial on Thursday. “The three teens are now facing potentially severe charges including possession of drug paraphernalia as well as having an illegal drug in drug-free school zone,” he said.
President Trump Concerned
In August, President Donald Trump urged Senate to pass a measure to stop synthetic opioid drugs such as fentanyl from being transported into the United States via the U.S. Postal Service system.
“It is outrageous that Poisonous Synthetic Heroin Fentanyl comes pouring into the U.S. Postal System from China,” he wrote on Aug. 20.
Shipments of fentanyl from China to the United States are “almost a form of warfare,” Trump said at a government meeting.
“In China, you have some pretty big companiePolice praised an elementary school pupil for turning in his parents for drug possession after he delivered a suspect package to school last week.
s sending that garbage and killing our people,” Trump said.
More than 71,500 Americans died of a drug overdose in 2017, according to data released by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The majority—at least 68 percent—of those deaths could be attributed to opioids such as fentanyl.
“[Chinese drug makers] have been using the internet to sell fentanyl and fentanyl analogs to drug traffickers and individual customers in the United States,” said Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein in a statement on Oct. 17, 2017.
Jack Philips contributed to this report.
