Robert J. Murphy, Special Agent in Charge of the Atlanta Field Division of the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), which oversees North Carolina, and Jackson County Sheriff Doug Farmer  joined U.S. Attorney King in making the announcement. 

According to filed court documents and the plea hearing, in April 2021, deputies with the Jackson County Sheriff’s Office arrested Tate for suspected distribution of fentanyl. Court records show that while Tate was in custody at the Jackson County Detention Center, she supplied two inmates with fentanyl, causing them to overdose. As a result, both overdose victims were transported to the hospital, and one victim was placed on a ventilator. Both victims later recovered from their drug overdose. According to court documents, over the course of the investigation into the drug overdose incidents, law enforcement determined that Tate had supplied each victim with a substance that contained fentanyl, which Tate was able to conceal and later retrieve from a body cavity. 

According to the DEA, fentanyl is a synthetic opioid that is 50 times more potent than heroin and 100 times more potent than morphine. Fentanyl remains the deadliest drug threat in the United States. According to the CDC, more than 100,000 people in the United States died of drug overdoses and drug poisonings in the 12-month period ending in January 2022. Sixty-seven percent of those deaths involved synthetic opioids like fentanyl. Some of these deaths were attributed to fentanyl mixed with other illicit drugs like cocaine, methamphetamine, and heroin, with many users unaware they were actually taking fentanyl. 

Tate is currently in federal custody. At sentencing, Tate faces a sentence of 20 years in prison. A sentencing date has not been set. 

U.S. Attorney King thanked the DEA’s Asheville Post of Duty and the Jackson County Sheriff’s Office for their investigation of this case. 

Assistant U.S. Attorney Thomas Kent of the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Charlotte is prosecuting the case.