About a month ago, Aaron Michael Shamo, a 26-year-old from Utah, set up a GoFundMe account, asking folks to crowdfund $8,000 so that he could experience a “wine adventure through California.” The page simply reads:
Hello !
i want to drink wine and vacation
Help spread the word!
Shamo raised $0 of his $8,000 goal. Maybe because the folks he was asking for donations knew that he was slinging fentanyl pills by the thousands. Maybe the page was set up to throw the laws off his scent. The cops surely knew, though, and they arrested him last Tuesday afternoon on charges of possession of fentanyl with intent to distribute. Law enforcement agents from several agencies, including the National Guard ad DEA, raided two homes in relation to the arrest. In Shamo’s home, they found “
a pill press and ‘bulk powdery substances’ believed to be fentanyl,” according to
The Salt Lake Tribune. In the other location, the authorities “located about 70,000 pills ‘that have the appearance of oxycodone’ and more than 25,000 pills that look like Xanax.”
The Tribune elaborates:
Shamo apparently had packages from China sent to other individuals over the past year to avoid detection. Agents seized “several of the packages,” tested the contents and found that one contained at least 120 grams of fentanyl.
DEA spokesman James Gothe told The Salt Lake Tribune that the warrant to search the homes would be sealed until Wednesday.
Shamo is accused of packaging the pills and mailing them throughout the U.S. His initial court appearance is set for Wednesday before U.S. Magistrate Judge Dustin Pead.
If convicted, Shamo could go on a vacation to the pen for 20 years and be fined as much as $1 million.
Read more about fentanyl here.