In his first visit to Charlotte since securing the Democratic nomination for governor, North Carolina Attorney General Josh Stein convened a news conference Wednesday to lay out his and other Democrats' efforts to fight the distribution of fentanyl.
Speaking to news reporters inside the Mecklenburg County Detention Center, Stein connected large drugmakers like Johnson & Johnson, which his office sued and negotiated a multimillion-dollar settlement with in 2022, to the current crisis of fake pills containing deadly amounts of synthetic opioids.
"The crisis, as we all know, started with the opioid companies that hooked millions of Americans on the pills. The second wave was heroin. And we're now in the third and deadliest wave, which is fentanyl," Stein said.
In addition to taking large drugmakers and wholesalers to court, Stein said his office helped convene a fentanyl task force with federal, state, local law enforcement, and his office instigated 670 wiretaps with local police departments to crack down on illicit drug distribution.
His office also helped draft North Carolina's new Stop Counterfeit Pill Act, sponsored by Republican state Sen. Tom McInnis, which makes it a felony to possess pill presses used to make counterfeit pills.
Stein also said he was pleased with this year's federal budget, which includes money to install new fentanyl-detection machines at entry points on the U.S.-Mexico border, and he called on the North Carolina General Assembly to fund a special unit of prosecutors in the attorney general’s office to focus specifically on fentanyl cases.
Nine North Carolinians die every day from fentanyl-related overdoses
Fentanyl has been a growing threat in the United States for decades. The synthetic opioid is cheap to produce and extremely potent. It's often added to other street drugs, making them cheaper, stronger and more deadly, even in small doses.
In 2023, nearly 3,400 North Carolinians lost their lives in fentanyl-related overdoses — or more than nine a day — and the crisis has been particularly deadly for young people.
In 2021, fentanyl was involved in 84% of all teen overdoses, according to the CDC. And fentanyl-related deaths among adolescents nearly tripled from 2019 to 2021, with almost a quarter of those deaths involving counterfeit pills.
At Wednesday's news conference, Stein was joined by a mother from Cornelius, Debbie Dalton, whose son Hunter died after ingesting fentanyl given to him by a friend in 2016.
"That call that my husband and I got was so shocking," Dalton said. "I was that person before this happened — if I heard the word 'overdose,' that's someone in a back alley with a needle in their arm. That's not going to touch my world ... it's not you until it is you."
Following her son's death, Dalton founded the Hunter Dalton HD Life Foundation which focuses on drug education and prevention.
Local efforts to curtail fentanyl deaths
At Wednesday's press conference, Stein was flanked by prominent local Democrats, including Mecklenburg County District Attorney Spencer Merriweather; Mecklenburg County Sheriff Garry McFadden; and U.S. Attorney for Western North Carolina Dena King, who was nominated by President Joe Biden.
Each detailed their efforts to crack down on fentanyl deaths and distribution. Merriweather said in the last 45 days, his office won two felony convictions against fentanyl traffickers in Charlotte.
McFadden oversaw the installation of a vending machine inside the county detention center that distributes naloxone, and said staff used the life-saving drug to reverse more than 27 opioid overdoses inside the jail.
King said her office broke up a drug distribution network in Charlotte, winning drug convictions against 21 people, as well as seizing drugs, firearms, more than $2.4 million in cash, two homes used as stash houses, 10 vehicles, a boat and a tractor-trailer with secret compartments.
Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Chief Johnny Jennings also spoke, highlighting his department's recent "No Cap, Those Pills Are Sus" campaign, which has spread anti-fentanyl messages through billboards and social media with Generation Z slang.
Still, more work is needed to reduce fentanyl-related deaths, Stein said.
"We have to raise the cost of doing business for these drug trafficking organizations, and we have to reduce the demand of people who want to consume them," he said.
Stein noted that North Carolina was due to receive $1.4 billion in an opioid settlement money in the coming years — money that can be used for opioid treatment, recovery, prevention or harm-reduction efforts. Some $73 million of those funds will come to Charlotte and Mecklenburg County.
Stein will face Republican Mark Robinson in the November election for North Carolina governor. Robinson currently serves as the state's lieutenant governor. Early voting in the general election in North Carolina will begin Oct. 17.
