SYRACUSE, N.Y. — A man from the Bronx pleaded guilty Wednesday to delivering more than 1,000 bricks of fentanyl to Syracuse, federal prosecutors said.
Marvin Antonio Lantigua, 31, agreed to deliver $75,000 worth of fentanyl in November 2021, according to a news release by the U.S. Attorney’s Office in the Northern District of New York.
Lantigua was a supplier for a Syracuse drug dealer who police and DEA agents bought drugs from five times using confidential informants, officers said in a criminal complaint.
That dealer told police Lantigua was the source for fentanyl. The dealer said he would haul more than 1,000 bricks of it each time he made a delivery to Syracuse, police said.
In November 2021, police monitored a call made by the dealer to Lantigua, police said. Lantigua said he would make another haul soon.
Four days later, Lantigua loaded a large SUV with 1,007 bricks of fentanyl that weighed about two pounds and headed to Syracuse, police said.
Police spotted the suspect two vehicles - a Ford Explorer driving behind a Honda Pilot - on Interstate 81 in Syracuse.
Lantigua was driving the Explorer and was accompanied by a passenger. There were two people in the Pilot.
Police stopped the vehicles after they got off the highway at the Court Street exit, they said.
Police found the drugs in the Honda Pilot.
Lantigua later told police he bought the drugs in New York City before packing them into bricks and loading them in the trunk of the Honda Pilot, police said.
He was charged with the possessing fentanyl and intending to sell it, prosecutors said.
Lantigua is scheduled to be sentenced in federal court Dec. 15. He faces 10 years to life in prison.
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