GWINNETT COUNTY, Ga. — A grieving mom is ramping up her fight against opioids after losing her son to a drug 40 times stronger than fentanyl.
Marquavies Broughton is the face of the first Nitazene case Gwinnett County has ever prosecuted.
The two women who supplied the pills pleaded guilty to involuntary manslaughter, and their sentences became final last week.
“Accountability was what I wanted, and the girls did take accountability,” mother Frederica Roberson said. “Hopefully, they get the healing they need, and I can move forward.”
Court records show Tamia Humes and Vicki Anderson arranged the sale and sent the pills by courier.
A judge gave them each 20 years, with six to serve for Humes and 10 for Anderson.
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“I’ve known these young ladies for several years, and I watched them go through an addiction as well,” Roberson told Channel 2 Gwinnett County Bureau Chief Matt Johnson.
Roberson said her son thought he was taking a single Percocet to quiet a craving last April.
Prosecutors say the pill held Nitazene, a synthetic opioid dozens of times stronger than fentanyl.
“When I started doing the CPR and the Narcan, he took his last breath in my arms,” Roberson said.
Soon after that, Roberson turned her grief into a foundation in her son’s name.
“What I vow to do is not allow another mom to feel the pain that I feel,” Roberson said.
In its first year, the Marquavies Bernard Broughton Foundation raised nearly $18,000 at a memorial run.
She took her son’s story to a Senate committee in Washington, DC, and now she is fighting to bring an anti-drug summit to Gwinnett.
“This foundation is how I hear my son’s heartbeat,” Roberson said.
A single dose of Narcan is often not enough for someone overdosing on Nitazine because of how powerful it is.
The two women were both sentenced under Georgia’s first offender act.
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