Feds interrupt drug deal, seize 40,000 fentanyl pills

EL PASO, Texas (Border Report) – Two men who allegedly tried to sell 40,000 fentanyl pills to a Drug Enforcement Administration informant have a date in U.S. federal district court this week.

Trelayne Equaun Hodge and Gustavo Torres Manjarrez are accused of conspiring to distribute approximately 4.7 kilos of a substance containing fentanyl during a drug deal monitored by federal agents at a hotel near the Phoenix airport on July 9.

The arrests came after the informant relayed to federal agents he was in touch with a suspected drug dealer for the purpose of purchasing 40,000 fentanyl pills. Court documents identify the suspect as Hodge and detail how he allegedly told the informant he didn’t have the pills but would get them from a third party. The alleged supplier was later identified as Torres.

Hodge and the informant agreed to meet at a hotel on East University Avenue and waited in the parking lot for a gray Kia sedan driven by Torres. Records show the three gathered inside Hodge’s Infinity SUV to inspect a “sample” bag of fentanyl pills.

DEA agents monitored the conversation though a recording device provided to the informant, who then excused himself from the suspects, went into the hotel and confirmed to agents having visually inspected the drugs.

Uniformed law enforcement officers immediately converged on Hodge and Torres and searched their vehicles, finding the small bag with 66.5 grams of fentanyl pills from Torres and a larger bag weighing 4.16 kilos in the floorboard of the Kia, according to a complaint affidavit filed in U.S. District Court for the District of Arizona.

The two men allegedly told investigators they were at the hotel parking lot to conduct a fentanyl pills transaction.

Hodge and Torres have a preliminary hearing before a U.S. magistrate judge in Phoenix on Wednesday.

Fentanyl is a potentially deadly synthetic opioid that has killed thousands of Americans since at least 2015. Fentanyl overdose deaths are down since December 2023, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Nonetheless, some 80,112 overdose deaths were recorded in 2024, with fentanyl figuring in many of those fatalities, according to the CDC.