ST. LOUIS – A man from St. Louis County on Thursday admitted selling the fentanyl that killed a pregnant woman in 2018.
Raymond Blankenship, 27, pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court to a felony charge of distribution of fentanyl. He admitted in his plea agreement that he sold fentanyl capsules to a St. Louis County woman on Sept. 17, 2018. She died later that day of acute fentanyl intoxication.
The woman arranged to buy the drug via Facebook messages with Blankenship. After her initial inquiry, Blankenship said he was out of the painkiller Percocet but would call someone else to see if they had any drugs, Blankenship’s plea says.
After her death, St. Louis County police detectives posed as the woman and arranged to buy more fentanyl from Blankenship. When police tried to arrest him, Blankenship ran and swallowed some of the capsules containing fentanyl.
Blankenship was indicted June 23, 2021 and is scheduled to be sentenced in September.
The case was investigated by the St. Louis County Police Department.