The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) allowed hundreds of thousands of fentanyl pills to reach the streets of New Mexico between 2023 and 2025, even as it grappled with the nation's deadliest drug epidemic, according to current and former agents and government records reviewed by The Associated Press. DEA agents reportedly monitored but did not seize shipments of fentanyl pills while federal prosecutors aimed to build larger criminal cases against traffickers of the synthetic opioid.
Agents and experts suggested this strategy gambled with public safety, potentially endangering communities in and around Albuquerque and possibly violating U.S. Justice Department guidelines intended to protect the public. DEA Special Agent David Howell told AP, "We poisoned our community to make cases. Through our own willful blindness, we get to say, ‘We don’t really know what happened to the drugs.’ But we 100% got people killed."
The DEA has stated that seizing every drug shipment is not plausible. However, the tactic of permitting large quantities of counterfeit painkillers onto the streets has reportedly shocked several veteran agents. While ridding the streets of illicit fentanyl, primarily manufactured in Mexican labs, has been the DEA's top priority amid soaring overdose deaths, its extreme lethality has upended traditional drug enforcement methods. The U.S. Justice Department developed guidelines encouraging agents to seize fentanyl whenever "practicable."
New Mexico, particularly Albuquerque, which has a neighborhood known as "War Zone" due to drug activity, remains at the epicenter of the fentanyl epidemic. Data indicates that while overdose deaths fell nationwide by 14% last year, New Mexico recorded a 21% spike.
Investigations and Prosecutions
Alex Uballez, who served as U.S. attorney in New Mexico from 2022 to 2023, confirmed that authorities sometimes allowed drug shipments to go unseized as part of an intelligence-gathering effort to build cases against major traffickers. He cited limited resources and a belief that prosecuting larger organizations would have a greater impact.
In one instance detailed in a 66-page report, DEA agents reportedly monitored a transaction in June 2023 at an Albuquerque mobile home park, noting that traffickers delivered 74,000 pills. Federal prosecutors later confirmed this figure in a court filing. Reports also indicate that investigators observed another shipment by the same ring days earlier, which also went unseized.
Howell filed a whistleblower complaint in 2023, asserting that authorities did not act on the observed shipments. He stated that federal authorities eventually arrested the traffickers months later, but the whereabouts of the unseized shipments remain unknown. Tristan Leavitt, president of whistleblower advocacy group Empower Oversight, called the situation "outrageous" and has called for investigations by the Senate Judiciary Committee and the Justice Department's Office of Inspector General.
A former DEA supervisor, speaking anonymously, claimed that millions of pills were permitted to go unseized during a multi-state investigation last year, which culminated in the DEA's largest fentanyl bust to date in May 2025, involving over 3 million pills. The supervisor suggested the organization could have been dismantled six months earlier.
The U.S. Attorney's Office in Albuquerque stated that the conduct Howell highlighted occurred under a prior administration and that current leadership is focused on aggressively prosecuting fentanyl trafficking. Tessa DuBerry, a spokesperson for the office, noted that pill counts estimated from intercepted calls may not be reliable.
Evolving Protocols and Whistleblower Claims
The Justice Department's internal "Fentanyl Protocols," adopted in 2017, initially directed agents to "seize or otherwise prevent the distribution" of fentanyl "as soon as practicable," emphasizing public safety. These rules were rewritten in 2024 to allow investigators more discretion, balancing public safety risks against the benefits of preserving an investigation.
The DEA's agent manual generally describes street-level drug seizures as the "usual course of action" but acknowledges exceptions where investigative objectives might be better served by not doing so. Agents have historically used "controlled deliveries" involving surveillance and sometimes replacement with fake narcotics before a takedown.
Some agents have drawn parallels between these tactics and the 2011 "Operation Fast and Furious," a gun-walking scandal that drew widespread criticism. Howell reportedly flagged overdose deaths he believed were linked to fentanyl pills that the DEA had allowed to flow to dealers, including the case of a toddler who died after ingesting fentanyl residue.
Howell's allegations were initially supported by the U.S. Office of Special Counsel, which found a "substantial likelihood of wrongdoing" and requested a Justice Department investigation. However, the Justice Department's Office of Professional Responsibility concluded in 2024 that the DEA and U.S. attorney's office made reasonable decisions allowing drugs to go unseized and that their inaction posed no "specific danger to public health."
Following his claims, Howell was reportedly moved to desk duty for over a year and faced negative performance evaluations. Prosecutors also barred him from testifying in federal court, citing his alleged refusal to follow directives regarding unseized drugs in long-term investigations. Current and former agents expressed disbelief at the watchdog's finding, given the extreme danger of fentanyl.