Federal Offenses Involving Fentanyl

"While fentanyl and fentanyl analogue offenders remain a small proportion of the overall federal drug trafficking caseload (5.8%), the number of fentanyl offenders and fentanyl analogue offenders has increased sharply over the last several years. As reflected in Figure 10, the prevalence of fentanyl was flat for the ten years from 2005 through 2014. Over the next five years, the trend shifted. Beginning in 2015, the number of fentanyl offenders more than doubled each fiscal year. By fiscal year 2019, the Commission recorded 886 fentanyl drug trafficking offenders, a 3,592 percent increase from 24 offenders in fiscal year 2015.¹²³

"The number of fentanyl analogue offenders also has increased precipitously in recent years. The number of such offenders was also largely stable from fiscal year 2012, the year the Commission first recorded a fentanyl analogue offender, through fiscal year 2016. Since fiscal year 2016, however, fentanyl analogue offenders increased 5,725 percent, from four offenders in fiscal year 2016 to 233 offenders in fiscal year 2019."