LISTEN: A bill, passed out of Georgia’s State Senate last week would create mandatory minimum sentences for those trafficking in Fentanyl. GPB’s Ellen Eldridge reports on the “Fentanyl Eradication and Removal Act.”
If passed by the Georgia House, the Fentanyl Eradication and Removal Act could mean up to 35 years in prison and hundreds of thousands in fines for those possessing fentanyl.
Senate Bill 79 comes on the heels of Austin's Law, which passed last year to add an involuntary manslaughter charge for anyone selling drugs that lead to a death.
Austin's Law was named after Austin Walters, a 31-year-old who died from a fentanyl overdose in 2021.
His father Gus Walters said, after the law passed, advocates realized that the law was insufficient, so SB 79 is needed.
"In order for Austin's law to work, somebody had to die," Walters said. "So, it was more of a reactive law. In other words, on the — on the front side, somebody dies and the reaction is, now we can go after the person that sold the pill that killed that individual."
The bill now heads to the Georgia House.
