A group law enforcement dubbed the "Fentanyl Robbery Gang," or F.R.G., would lure victims with the promise of prostitution and then drug them — resulting in four deaths — in a crime ring that stretched from New Hampshire to Virginia, the Justice Department said.
All seven members of the group, some of whom were affiliated with New York gangs, are in custody, the U.S. Attorney’s office for the Middle District of Pennsylvania said in a news release Friday.
They were charged with two counts of distributing a controlled substance resulting in death and serious injury, conspiracy to distribute the substance leading to death and serious injury, kidnapping, aggravated identity theft and two counts of brandishing firearms "in furtherance of a drug trafficking crime."
One of the group's methods was to use dating websites to connect with people who wanted to hire prostitutes, authorities said. It would offer the people narcotics laced with fentanyl to incapacitate them, forcing them to take it if they refused or "surreptitiously introducing it into the victim’s body" before it robbed them of money and other valuables, the Justice Department said.
"If a victim was not incapacitated, or not incapacitated quickly enough, members of the F.R.G. would instead change course and simply commit home-invasion robberies where they would be let into the victim’s home by other members and associates and then steal items of value at gunpoint or through other violent means, including threats, beatings, and aggravated assault," the Justice Department said.
Four people died after they overdosed on fentanyl — three in Luzerne County, Pennsylvania, and one in Portsmouth, New Hampshire — according to the Justice Department.
Law enforcement is looking for any additional members or victims of F.R.G. Anyone with information about the group is encouraged to call the FBI.
It's not clear whether any members of the group have legal representation.
