Thousands of lives lost. If it doesn't come from *** doctor, it's not legit with lasting impacts. You voted on fentaNYL 10 times at least 10 times. Yeah. Now local leaders are taking on *** deadly drug. How many of you have heard of fentaNYL hitting the streets with vital resources? Has it saved lives and cracking down on dealers who sold the drugs? When did they sell the drugs? The programs and people preventing poisonings? If Jeffrey's life could save one, it's all worth it and saving lives and we're making *** significant impact in my mind for sure. We have to step up and do our part in *** KCR *** three project community special breaking free from fentaNYL after years of skyrocketing deaths and overdoses. The fentaNYL epidemic is finally loosening its grip in our area. Thanks in part to *** group of community leaders dedicated to fighting the crisis. So take *** look at these numbers from Sacramento County. These are the numbers of fentaNYL related deaths since 29 in 2023 that hit an all time high with 404 deaths this year though less than 200 that's even more dramatic. Than the national drop. We've spent the last year speaking with volunteers, doctors, prosecutors and families about how they're preventing overdoses and saving lives. So this was of course, the very first mommy son. Moment daddy, son, moment Jeffrey was always kind of *** difficult child. Always kind of had something in him that he was yearning for. I believe at *** young age from the moment she gave birth, Marlena Potter knew her son. Jeffrey was different. I feel like he was looking for that feeling of feeling, ok, spending his life struggling to be comfortable in his own skin. He was funny. He was extremely smart, played sports, but the first time that he tried um Vicodin in high school, he said mom, it was just like *** like he said, he described it as it just felt like I could talk to people without being anxious. I could talk to girls, I could talk to teachers. He didn't want to use it. But there it was to the point where you couldn't find other stuff, but fentaNYL found him. He's gone to rehab. He's lived in sober living. We've done tough love, we've done love neither work. He wanted sobriety, his disease impacting not only Jeffrey but everyone around him, including his father, Jeff, probably the most, the biggest thing about him is, is big heart. Um I'm not gonna be able to do it in the name of the father and the son and the Holy spirit guard my life. Oh God. From the works of the evil one. Please keep me safe and protected at all times. Saint Francis of Assisi. How many of you have heard of fentaNYL Saint Francis High School is focusing on keeping this deadly drug away from its students. You can get *** fentaNYL pill, fake pill on the street in Sacramento right now for 30 cents. So technically, they just need to make *** couple of bucks and they can stay high all day long. Angela Webb is the founder and CEO of arrive alive California. And the day after Christmas Zach's dad found him with his hand on his computer, the Game of Minecraft on and him dead. And it came out to be that the dealer tracked him through Snapchat, got *** hold of him, sold him what he thought was *** Percocet, but it was *** fentaNYL laced pill. She travels the state educating teens about the opioid crisis. FentaNYL is 50 times more powerful than heroin. 100 times more powerful than morphine. And it's *** very, very inexpensive to make. I think it's very important for you and your families to understand there are two sides to this coin. You see there are people who actually are looking for fentaNYL, those that have substance use disorders are looking to have fentaNYL as their drug of choice. Now we're heading, going into um the heights which is right here. You see this much happening and that it's out of control and nobody knows what to do. Um We have to step up and do our part. Doctor Gina Warren is well known around Sacramento's El Paso Heights. All right, baby. Yeah. When we don't hear y'all, it makes us nervous. All right, baby. She's the founder of the Neighborhood Wellness Foundation and *** pharmacist. Thank you. You're welcome. FentaNYL is *** painkiller and so people are trying to numb their pain and that pain is also very emotional. And so what we are able to do now is help with harm reduction. She's in *** unique position to help prevent deaths from fentaNYL in that county. We are the number one fentaNYL related deaths is in 95838 is fentaNYL. The biggest thing that you're seeing out in the streets. Yeah, it is. He won't leave you alone for some reason if he gets the degree to work, we provide not just food and clothing but also the Narcan and that's how we make the connection is that you've gotta connect with folks before you start asking them to stop doing drugs. Come here, baby, you got, you got enough. Do you wanna use this? OK. You got it. OK. OK. What are people overdosing from right now in the States? Towards the fit? All? So yeah, fentaNYL and basically it, what was your experience actually having to administer Narcan to someone? You gotta basically get to them right away and make sure to keep them awake and stuff. So they don't pass out. Are you glad that you have it for other people? Yes, I am. Has it saved lives? It has, it definitely has. How many that you know of? At least I do. I know friends of yours. I knew reversing dozens of overdoses. This is where most of the, uh, overdoses happened. Numbers nearly added to *** grim total. All right, you guys take care. Yeah, we'll see you Thursday. How do you feel when you're on fentaNYL? It feels good if you're like, at the ride high, it's awesome. You know, it's like, it's like being on top of the world. How does it feel when it's bad when it's bad? It's like, just wanna crawl on my skin and, you know, just like hide. Good afternoon. Charles. Charles half is *** recovering addict and I got out of prison, you know, after doing five years and, and I got out there and just me is different. There was, it wasn't the same and it wasn't getting me high. I was homeless and so they're all doing heroin and fentaNYL, you know? And so I was like, hey, let me, let me get *** hit. You know what I mean? That's how it started. It was like, let me get hit of that. All right. There you go. Charles, thank you. I came here and asked for methadone, you know, and they put me on *** low dose at first spending his entire adult life battling his demons. He's even been on the brink of death at least 10 times. You know, I voted on fentaNYL. You voted on fentaNYL 10 times at least 10 times. Yeah. After *** stint in rehab, he ended up at core. It's *** clinic offering medical treatment and counseling for opiate use disorders in Sacramento. I feel like *** broken record. But what's out there is fentaNYL and it's changed everything. It's changed landscape of addiction. Doctor Christine Bell is the medical director, overseeing more than 800 patients, the majority of them addicted to fentaNYL. When I first started 15 years, 14 years ago, it was heroin. Always it was heroin and then pills and now fentaNYL. So if somebody is thinking they're getting heroin, they're still getting fentaNYL. It's harder to treat than other opioid addictions and doesn't discriminate. We see all types of people, teachers, professors, people who work for the state, people who work important jobs who unfortunately fell into the wrong situation and are now addicted to fentaNYL. Last year, President Biden met with Chinese leader Xi Jinping in the Bay Area for the first time since 2022. Discussing China's role in manufacturing the fentaNYL crisis. China had *** free pass. They can make whatever parts of fentaNYL they wanted and they would get like tax breaks and send it to Mexico and then Mexico would send it to us. China is the primary source of fentaNYL and fentaNYL related substances in the world we find out, oh, they've made this chemical composition that is not allowed in our country and they just tweak it *** little bit more and they make *** better, stronger dirtier version that slips by. Hey, how you doing? Good. How's adjusting to the work stuff? It's going all right. It's going good. I like it. You know, what do they have you doing? Um, picking trash on the side of the road, you know? Sounds kind of cool moving up. I love that for you. 100 bucks *** day, dude. It's better than I do. Yeah. Charles admits fentaNYL addiction. Like the drug itself can be unpredictable. I don't know. I was excited about doing something different. Anything happened. I could probably get high when I walk out of this interview. You know what I mean? You never know. But right now I'm in *** good place, you know what I mean? I'm, I'm, I'm stable and I'm honestly like, I'm really happy for you when we come back. Our story continues with how the California National Guard is stopping the flow of fentaNYL across the southern border and how families of victims are raising awareness about the crisis, turning pain into purpose. Welcome back to our KCR *** three project community special breaking free from fentaNYL. I spent *** year talking to former addicts family members and prosecutors about how they're tackling the fentaNYL crisis and here in California. One of the biggest challenges is preventing the drug from crossing the southern border in the first place. My next guest is from the Sacramento County District Attorney's office. She is Deputy district attorney Sonia Satchel and she's gonna tell you what their office is doing with the courtroom measures. Please give her *** warm, I don't envy your generation. Unfortunately, you live now with this dangerous drug that does not allow for mistakes. Sacramento County district attorney 10 Ho going straight to the source starting with prosecution. What we do is on every single possession or sale of narcotics. We give that advice. We tell defendants, hey, if you're selling drugs in the future and somebody dies from *** fentaNYL overdose, you can be charged with murder, his fentaNYL rapid response team making that easier by changing how they respond to overdose scenes so that we can start looking and collecting the evidence that we need right away so that we can prosecute people so we can hold people accountable. There's going to be an investigation done similar to like *** regular homicide case where we were falling. Really? Who sold the drugs? When did they sell the drugs? And did they sell it? Knowing that it contained fentaNYL Sacramento PD making its first homicide arrest in *** fentaNYL overdose case. Thanks to its partnership with the county and we have four pending homicide cases as *** result of these advisements, even with local enforcement, it's still *** complex problem with no one's solution. We need to do whatever we can to make sure that those who are peddling and selling death essentially with fet are held responsible. The issue made more complicated by the Southern, the drug being smuggled from Mexico and straight into California. And we're making *** significant impact in my mind. For sure. FentaNYL seizures are up more than 1000% in the state. The California National Guard making progress. Thanks to 15 million in state funding annually. These are young soldiers and airmen that they've been trained to really understand characterize and map out criminal networks within our society. For students at Saint Francis. This is *** wake up call. My heart's passion is to get to these kids, serve our community and save lives. Please go change the world that one pill can kill it is your decisions that shape your destiny go make good choices and thank you for having us again. He knew he wasn't gonna get out alive. He knew that that drug called him. It's hard driving by and knowing your son's body is here. It's, it's, it takes your breath away. On June 17th, 2023 33 year old Jeffrey Potter died of *** fentaNYL overdose. He's free from the bondage of addiction. He's free from the stigma. He's free from the judgment. He's free from the battle even though his soul is finally at peace. It's *** bittersweet reminder. He's never coming back. It's just still surreal. It just still feels, I'm mad, I'm mad and I'm mad at him sometimes. But then I try not to be mad at him because I know he was helpless, but I'm mad, mad at the system. But I want him here, I want him here. The vicious cycle of fentaNYL destroying lives and families in its path. But some loved ones like Marlena continue to fight. It's *** busy street. So I don't know how many people will actually pull over and stop. These are faces. These are, these are our loved ones. This billboard, one of many across northern California putting names and faces to the fentaNYL epidemic. If Jeffrey's life could save one, it's all worth it. They're using their pain for purpose. Mine Jeffrey for uh Barbara 33 there, the yellow shirt coming together to bring awareness. It is. Now to the point if we don't take it seriously, we've lost *** whole generation. How's your son doing? You know, he's ok. He doesn't really like to talk about it. They are helping each other heal. It's difficult for people to understand, but we understand each other. So it helps sharing hope and finding serenity. One day at *** time for me, it brings meaning for those lost and those worth fighting for it. It helps me stay close and connected to him and that he's never gonna be forgotten. Welcome back and thank you for joining us for *** KCR *** three special breaking free from fentaNYL. Joining us today is Plaster County District Attorney, Morgan Guyer and Doctor Christine Bell from the core clinic you saw in our story. So I want to start with you, how has the prosecution of fentaNYL related cases changed? It's changed in that before cases like this were treated as overdose scenes. So law enforcement's role would really be *** sort of *** stand by as medical personnel treated the person that experienced these symptoms. Now they're being treated as crime scenes. Now there is *** collection of evidence and the the gathering of forensic evidence to try and support at least an investigation and if not *** criminal case. So, Doctor Bell, we've talked about how this has changed your treatment of your clients. How has it changed over the past few years and even more recently. So we uh we have, you know, *** few tools in our toolbox and medications that we've been using for quite some time and they worked great for the oxy, the pill mill um epidemic. They were great for the heroin epidemic. And then we had the fentaNYL epidemic come along. And so it changed *** lot about, you know, we were trying to use the same tools the same way and it wasn't working. So we had to rethink everything we had to go back, kind of from the beginning and learn to respond and not react and kind of go patient to patient and individualize our care better. Um We had to use different starting doses. We had to sometimes slow that way down, sometimes speed that way up. And so that was *** really big, like *** huge learning curve I think made us better as *** clinic, but it was very difficult because our goal is to engage and retain patients so we can help them do better. Get back to their lives, get back to their jobs or get back to their families. And we can't do that if we kept losing them and we were losing them *** lot in the beginning because we weren't able to use our medications the same way. So d *** guy we know that your county is leading the way and prosecuting these cases. How is this an issue of focus for you? And why is it so important? We, our community, we were hit by the fentaNYL epidemic. Uh just like every community, we saw young people in particular dying senselessly and needlessly. Uh And we knew we had to get active quickly. Um We began an aggressive outreach campaign. Uh We partnered with our bereaved and grieving parents to spread the message of the dangers and we increased our prosecution and enforcement efforts to hold those who sell this poison accountable. What messages do you have for the community out there in terms of the dangers of fentaNYL, the danger. It's in everything. It's *** very easy to add to, you know, anything that you're taking that you're buying on the street, there's *** pretty good chance that there's fentaNYL in it. Um, that's important to know. Um, and I think that the patients who are seeking fentaNYL are definitely more wise to, you know, how much they can and cannot handle. But, um, having Narcan on everyone should have Narcan, every single person should have Narcan in their car on their person. Um, We should, I mean, that's kind of, and, and if you are someone who's out buying medication, you should have *** fentaNYL test drive, people need to know how to use those in terms of the cases that you're seeing. Do you think that dealers and people who are out there selling the drug are seeing that there are some very real consequences to this? And do you think that's making an impact on what's being sold on the street? I most definitely think it's making an impact. We have anecdotally. We hear from dealers who have been caught, who talk about the consequences that they might get in certain areas of the state, in certain counties. And I think as more and more counties become more aggressive and I always say we're not going to arrest and prosecute our way out of it, but it is one critical component uh to tackling this crisis along with our outreach, our education, our, our treatment. Um But I think that enforcement and is catching on, I think people are talking about and I think ultimately, it will make *** difference. All right, thank you both for joining us. And again, we want to thank you for joining us here for our KCR *** three project community special breaking free from fentaNYL. We have more stories and resources posted on our website and our KCR *** three app.