The U.S. Attorney's Office says an Iowa man is going to prison for twenty years for his part in a fentanyl distribution ring that caused the death of a man.
Officials say 30 year old Charles Jesse Beuterbaugh was sentenced Tuesday on a charge of Conspiracy to Distribute Fentanyl Analogue that caused Death or Seriously Bodily Injury. U.S. Attorney Marc Krickbaum said that Beuterbaugh trafficked fentanyl from China to users in Western Iowa and Eastern Nebraska.
In June 2015 law enforcement were called to a Carter Lake home for an unresponsive man. Officers discovered the body of a twenty year old man in Beuterbaugh's home and then learned that another man had been transported from Beuterbaugh's house to the hospital and placed on life support prior to their arrival.
During the investigation, it was discovered that Beuterbaugh had given “acetyl fentanyl” to both of the victims. The drug was determined to be the cause of the twenty year old's death and what put the second man in the hospital. The fentanyl had been obtained by Beuterbaugh through an organization that was distributing the drug between November 2014 through April of 2016.
All members of the trafficking ring entered guilty pleas, with 27 year old Dustin Sullivan, of Council Bluffs, receiving a 162 month sentence and 31 year old Cody Lanus, of Omaha, receiving a sentence of 144 months in prison. Another member of the organization, Michael Redmond Jr., was sentenced to 120 months in prison.
Sullivan, Lanus, Redmond and Beuterbaugh will all serve five years on supervised release after their imprisonment.
Two other parties involved, Amalia Pandis and Walter O'Donohue III, will be sentenced in February 2018.