A Maryland man who led a fatal fentanyl ring and committed identity theft to scam state unemployment programs has been sentenced to 14 years in prison. Collin Edwards, 29, from Largo, often referred to by his alias “Chills,” admitted to his role in distributing significant amounts of the dangerous opioid and to using stolen personal information for fraudulent financial gain, amassing over $250,000, as reported by the U.S. Attorney's Office.
According to a statement from the U.S. Attorney Matthew M. Graves, Edwards was caught managing an operation that produced counterfeit oxycodone pills laced with fentanyl, using various locations including a luxury apartment in the Navy Yard area to manufacture and distribute the drugs, during the FBI operation, agents uncovered more than 516 pills and upwards of 76 grams of a mixture with detectable fentanyl.
In August 2021, law enforcement began investigating Edwards and his group, they discovered a makeshift drug lab in Laurel, Maryland, which led to uncovering the larger operation, Edwards was arrested in Baltimore in October 2022 after evading authorities following a high-speed chase and had multiple previous convictions for drug offenses and armed robbery. U.S. District Judge Amit P. Mehta also ordered Edwards to five years of supervised release after completing his sentence and agreed to forefeit $100,000 in criminal proceeds.
The investigation unraveled an extensive fraud scheme where Edwards and co-conspirators used stolen data containing identities of hundreds of unsuspecting victims to file for unauthorized unemployment benefits. The FBI discovered countless text messages detailing these transactions; in one conversation dated May 15, 2020, Edwards clearly stated, "I’m over here counting out 5000 pills bro. Hold on," according to the U.S. Attorney's Office. The criminal enterprise was robust enough to include discussions about pill strength, pricing, and logistics, such as moving an industrial pill press.
Others implicated in the case received varying sentences: Chase Cole received just over a year, Garnell Lucas got six years, Tyron Waters got 70 months, and Laura Garvin was sentenced to 24 months of incarceration; the collaborative investigation was conducted by the FBI’s Washington Field Office, the U.S. Department of Labor, Office of the Inspector General, and was prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Kevin Rosenberg with the assistance of former Special Assistants U.S. Attorneys Sarah J. Rasalam and Marnee Rand.
