New York District Attorney Indicts Major Online Drug Fake Xanax and Illicit Drug Seller

Source: Manhattan District Attorney's Office.

The office of Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus R. Vance Jr. announced the largest counterfeit pill seizure in New Jersey history this month.  In addition to large quantities of other illicit drugs, between 420,000 and 620,000 counterfeit Xanax were discovered during the arrest and search of Chester Anderson, Jarrette Codd, and Ronald MacCarty for their alleged role in selling $2.3 million worth of illicit drugs via the internet.

In addition to the pills and other drugs, the Manhattan District Attorney reports that four pill presses, two industrial mixers, and punch dies were used to produce pills that looked like Xanax.

Wired Magazine refers to their storefront, sinmed, as “one of the largest drug vendors at Dream Market,” a dark web marketplace.  Wired notes that what was unusual about this particular bust was that the Manhattan DA tracked down sinmed using reports of suspicious ATM withdrawals. The Manhattan District Attorney allege that “the defendants laundered more than $2.3 million in proceeds by using the cryptocurrency they received as payment to load pre-paid debit cards, and collectively withdrew more than $1 million from ATMs in Manhattan and New Jersey.”

According to WOBM, the Manhattan District Attorney was able to identify 1,000 packages allegedly shipped across the country by the defendants, along with another 8,000 pills found in intercepted mail packages.

Assistant District Attorneys Daniel Haier and Jessica Peck are handling the prosecution of the case under the supervision of Assistant District Attorney Elizabeth Roper (Chief of the Cybercrime and Identity Theft Bureau), Assistant District Attorney Jeremy Glickman (Deputy Chief of the Cybercrime and Identity Theft Bureau and Counsel to the Investigation Division) and Executive Assistant District Attorney Michael Sachs (Chief of the Investigation Division). Supervising Rackets Investigator Gregory Dunlavey, former Special Investigator William Burmeister, High Technology Analysis Unit Deputy Director David Chan, and Analysts Jonathan Behnken, Catherine Wigdor, and Charles Fraker assisted with the investigation.