Man Charged With Selling Fentanyl Pills That Killed Murray, Utah Woman

On July 10, 2019, the U.S. Attorney’s Office in the District of Utah charged a Utah man with distribution of fentanyl resulting in a death and conspiracy to distribute fentanyl.  A complaint filed on July 3 alleges that 24-year-old John Aaron Favro of West Jordan distributed more than 10,000 counterfeit oxycodone pills made with fentanyl over the course of 2016. According to the complaint, pills he sold to a woman in Murray, Utah in November 2016 caused her fatal poisoning. Farvo, who pleaded not guilty on July 11th, could face life in prison.

Utah, which has reported other deaths from counterfeit pills in Layton, and West Haven, has been the site of several counterfeit opioid rings—including large manufacturing operations shut down in Cottonwood Heights in 2017 and South Jordan in 2018 and a smaller scale one in Sandy, Utah in 2016.

Learn more about how the counterfeit prescription drug trade has touched Utah by reading our state information sheet.