Seven people have been charged in a case in which federal prosecutors allege that a group they call the Fentanyl Robbery Gang arranged fake dates online with people and then drugged them with fentanyl to steal their possessions.
Four of the group’s targeted individuals fatally overdosed on fentanyl, according to the United States Attorney’s Office for the Middle District of Pennsylvania, which did not name the victims in the recent press release, but said that three of the deaths had occurred in Pennsylvania and one in New Hampshire.
Investigators are looking for more people affiliated with the alleged criminal organization, as well as additional victims, according to prosecutors.
Amanda Marie Correa, 29, Robert Andrew Barnes, 24, Christine Deann DiCarlo, 50, Shaqare Jaymont Blackwell, 23, Shakur Serafin Brownstein, 27, Dylan Wilson Small, 35, and Samual Jordan, 42, were charged in a seven-count superseding indictment.
They are charged with one count each of conspiracy to distribute a controlled substance resulting in death and serious bodily injury, kidnapping and aggravated identity theft, along with two counts each of distributing fentanyl resulting in death and serious bodily injury and brandishing firearms in furtherance of a drug trafficking crime.
Some of the seven charged individuals — all of whom are in custody and who prosecutors say trafficked drugs and guns — had other New York gang affiliations, prosecutors allege.
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Prosecutors allege that they picked their victims from dating websites where individuals can hire sex workers. Then, the Fentanyl Robbery Gang members and associates “would arrange to come to the victim’s location with the intent to rob the victim of firearms, cash, cellular telephones, identification documents, debit and credit cards, drugs, and other items of value,” prosecutors allege.
The two charged women allegedly played a special role on the purported dates, which unsuspecting men had booked with women through dating websites including Plenty of Fish and MeetMe, PA Homepage reported from a press conference with law enforcement.
The outlet, citing prosecutors, reported that Correa allegedly was the ringleader who organized the fake dates, while DiCarlo attended them with her.
At the location, prosecutors allege, the group’s affiliates would offer their targets narcotics — “usually purported cocaine” — but “unbeknownst to the victim, the narcotics contained fentanyl.”
If the individual declined the drugs, then the fentanyl-laced narcotics would be administered “forcibly or surreptitiously,” prosecutors allege.
And if the “victim was not incapacitated, or not incapacitated quickly enough,” prosecutors allege that the affiliates “would instead change course and simply commit home-invasion robberies,” stealing “items of value at gunpoint or through other violent means, including threats, beatings, and aggravated assault.”
It was not immediately clear if any of the seven people charged in the superseding indictment had yet entered pleas in the case or retained legal representation.
So far, law enforcement have identified more than 50 victims from seven states, per PA Homepage. Those victims lived in Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania and Virginia.
The investigation is ongoing.
If you – or someone you know – was a victim of the Fentanyl Robbery Gang, or if you have information about the criminal organization, you may contact the FBI at 570-344-2404.
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