Nevada lawmakers are hearing bills aimed at changing the amount of fentanyl required to be considered certain levels of trafficking.
One of those bills is Senate Bill 35 and is being sponsored by Nevada Attorney General Aaron Ford.
According to Ford, the bill would make the amount of fentanyl between 14 and 28 grams enough for a mid-level trafficking charge. With more than four grams and less than 14 being considered a low-level trafficking charge.
"This bill would give law enforcement the ability it needs to keep poison off the street, to keep vulnerable Nevadan's from accessing it and god forbid from dying from it," Ford said. "It will ensure we're taking all the steps that we possibly can to mitigate this crisis."
Anything above 28 grams would be considered high-level.
With the proposed bills calling for an increased punishment with fentanyl, those in opposition are concerned about this being a repeat on the war on drugs.
"Increasing penalties for possession of fentanyl is another iteration of the drug wars in effective punitive strategies whether or not it is labeled that way," said Erica Roth, Deputy Public Defender in Washoe County. "The effect of that is true."
In Nevada, the only resources they have for testing fentanyl is qualitative and not quantitative.
This means that if a bag of narcotics were to have traces of fentanyl in it, they couldn't distinguish exactly how much fentanyl is in there, just the presence of it.
John Piro from the Clark County Public Defender's Office sent a proposed amendment for the bills.
The amendment would remove the low-level trafficking charges of fentanyl from the bill.
Piro is also asking for the bill to change to pure fentanyl, rather than someone being charged with narcotics that could have traces of fentanyl in it.
However, the Attorney General says finding pure fentanyl is rare.
"Well, we don't see pure fentanyl out there, that's not what's happening, that's not the reality on the streets," Ford said. "But I do not agree focusing on only pure fentanyl is the approach to take here when we know fentanyl adulterating many other drugs right now."
The Attorney General also asked for an amendment for the bill to include medication assisted treatment so jails and prisons can offer more help to inmates.
The bill was heard in the Senate Judiciary on Monday, but no action has since been taken.
The full bill can be found below:
