Snapchat Fentanyl Sales: National Crime Prevention Council Urges DOJ to Investigate Social Media Over Drug Sales

Drug dealers have been using the popular instant messaging app, Snapchat, to sell drugs to kids. Now, the National Crime Prevention Council sent a letter to Attorney General Merrick Garland, calling for the DOJ to investigate the sale of drugs over social media.

Best known for their ads featuring McGruff the Crime Dog, the National Crime Prevention Council asked the DOJ to clamp down on the role of social media in the spread of fentanyl, which the DEA says is the deadliest drug the country has ever seen.

The group's executive director Paul DePonte wrote in a statement that these drug dealers are "using American innovation to sell lethal products" and added that "Social media platforms bear some responsibility for these deaths."

DePonte pointed out that Snapchat is especially popular among drug dealers, as its encrypted technology and disappearing messages make their transactions hard to catch. According to the Associated Press, while drug dealers usually use social media and money exchange platforms in their transactions, many of these drug dealers prefer Snapchat for those reasons pointed out by DePonte.

The Case That Placed Scrutiny on Snapchat Over Fentanyl Sales

In June 2020, a 14-year-old boy named Alex Neville bought a pill that he thought was Oxycontin via Snapchat. This led to him overdosing on fentanyl and dying. This led his parents to approach the National Crime Prevention Council for help.

Yahoo! Finance reported that the boy received a haircut and had lunch with his father, before hanging out with friends. When he returned to the family's Orange County, California home, he went inside his room and took the deadly fentanyl-laced pill that he thought was Oxycontin,

His mother, Amy Neville, stated that she found him in his bed the next morning, and "The rest is craziness."

The family admitted they knew little about fentanyl and Amy Neville only knew about it after her son died. She also stated that she has also heard about more families whose kids have also died of overdoses after buying pills over Snapchat. These pills are often sold cheaply, usually for less than $25.

She, along with other families, have sued Snapchat in California through a class-action lawsuit. The suit was filed by the Social Media Victims Law Center, which is now representing 28 families, all of whom have kids who bought pills via Snapchat.

What Snapchat Is Doing About These Fentanyl Sales

Snapchat is well aware of its platform being used by drug dealers to sell fentanyl, according to Turnbridge. They issued a statement in October of last year that acknowledged what was happening in their platform.

The statement also said that Snapchat is "determined to remove illegal drug sales from our platform." They have also invested in ways to detect these deals, as well as collaborating with law enforcement in dealing with these illegal drug sales.

Snapchat has also implemented some changes, but critics like Neville said that these were just "a little Band-Aid on a gaping wound."

This article is owned by Latin Post.

Written by: Rick Martin

WATCH: 'It was Snapchat': Woman says her daughter was sold counterfeit, fentanyl-laced pill on social media - Denver7 - The Denver Channel