After failing to get more punitive legislation passed to reduce fentanyl deaths, California Republican lawmakers, also including a handful of Democrats, want to appeal to voters. Nevada County’s Assemblymember, Megan Dahle, is supporting a state constitutional amendment. Similar to DUI offenders, it would require judges to warn convicted drug dealers that they could face murder charges if they sell counterfeit drugs that kill people…

click to listen to Megan Dahle

But whether it gets approval from the Democratic majority in the Legislature is unknown. Dahle admits the proposal would be at odds with recent efforts to reduce prison overcrowding. The decline of the number of inmates has been partly due to less severe sentences for drug crimes…

click to listen to Megan Dahle

Dahle says the only punitive measure making it through the Assembly creates a sentencing enhancement for possessing enough fentanyl to kill at least half-a-million people. The California Department of Public Health says more than 71-hundred people died of opioid overdoses in 2021. And 83-percent of those fatalities were related to fentanyl.