Sacramento Grand Jury indicts Riverside county man and woman for fentanyl distribution and money laundering conspiracy

 

Date: May 12, 2022

Contact: newsroom@ci.irs.gov

Sacramento, CA — A federal grand jury returned a two-count indictment today against Holly Adams and Devlin Hosner of Indio, charging them with conspiracy to distribute and possess with intent to distribute fentanyl and methamphetamine, and with conspiracy to launder money, U.S. Attorney Phillip A. Talbert announced.

According to court documents, Adams and Hosner operated the vendor accounts "igogrraawwr" and "its4real" on the dark web marketplaces ToRReZ and Dark0de, respectively, through which they sold tens of thousands of counterfeit oxycodone pills containing fentanyl in exchange for cryptocurrency. Adams and Hosner shipped these fentanyl pills to buyers throughout the United States, using the U.S. Postal Service, UPS, and other means of delivery.

Adams and Hosner operated vendor accounts on the dark web from at least May 2021 through March 2022. In the course of their conspiracy, Adams and Hosner finalized over 1,100 transactions of narcotics and other contraband and received more than $800,000 in cryptocurrency. Federal law enforcement officers executed a search warrant in March at a hotel in Riverside County where Adams and Hosner were residing, and recovered more than 10,000 counterfeit oxycodone pills as well as approximately 60 grams of methamphetamine.

This case is the product of an investigation by the Northern California Illicit Digital Economy (NCIDE) Task Force, which includes the Internal Revenue Service - Criminal Investigation, Homeland Security Investigations, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the U.S. Postal Inspection Service, and the U.S. Postal Service Office of Inspector General. The NCIDE Task Force is a federal task force focused on targeting all forms of illicit dark web and cryptocurrency activity in the Eastern District of California and beyond. Assistant U.S. Attorney Sam Stefanki is prosecuting the case.

If convicted, Adams and Hosner each face a maximum statutory penalty of life in prison and a $10 million fine. Any sentence, however, would be determined at the discretion of the court after consideration of any applicable statutory factors and the Federal Sentencing Guidelines, which take into account a number of variables. The charges are only allegations; the defendants are presumed innocent until and unless proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.