SAN FRANCISCO — San Francisco police have arrested four people and seized more than 20,000 pills, including suspected counterfeit medications, following a months-long investigation that began with the April overdose death of a 16-year-old boy — the city’s first known fatal case involving the synthetic opioid cychlorphine.
The San Francisco Police Department said officers served search warrants at three San Francisco homes on Sept. 8 and 9 after an investigation that included multiple controlled drug buys. According to CBS San Francisco, the teen, identified by NBC Bay Area and The Voice of San Francisco as Dante (Paul) Lacourte, was found unresponsive by his mother at the family’s Bush Street home in Nob Hill on April 7.
The arrests
Police booked four adults into San Francisco County Jail on Sept. 8 and 9, according to The Voice of San Francisco: Leander Pitts, 46, facing seven counts including transportation and sale of controlled substances (methamphetamine and Xanax); Starr Lamare, 39, facing ten counts including transportation and sale of methamphetamine and heroin, assault-weapon possession, and felon in possession of a firearm; Nicholas Wallace, 46, facing six counts including sale of a substance in lieu of a controlled substance and felon in possession of a firearm; and Sharonee Hyson, 44, facing three counts including felon in possession of a firearm and possession of cocaine base for sale.
Officers reported recovering more than 20,000 counterfeit pills — described by the Epoch Times as pills stamped to resemble Xanax, oxycodone, hydrocodone, cyclobenzaprine and fentanyl — along with at least three firearms, including a semi-automatic rifle and a semi-automatic pistol, roughly $2,267 in cash, and about 6.5 grams of black tar heroin. Police have not said the four suspects supplied the pills that killed the teen in April, and it remains unclear whether their alleged activity is connected to his death; the department says the investigation remains open.
“The pills that are sold on our streets are likely not manufactured by legitimate pharmaceutical companies under strict regulations,” Police Chief Derrick Lew said. “Instead, they are cobbled together with poisonous chemicals by drug dealers.”
Mayor Daniel Lurie, who joined Lew and District Attorney Brooke Jenkins at a news conference announcing the arrests, said, “San Francisco was caught flat-footed by the fentanyl crisis. We will not let that happen again.” Jenkins, who has pressed state lawmakers to classify cychlorphine as a controlled substance under California law, called it “a sad day” given “the loss of life of a 16-year-old” and said of the scheduling gap, “This is a drug that needs to be added to that list right away.”
What cychlorphine is
Cychlorphine, also called N-propionitrile chlorphine, belongs to a newer class of synthetic opioids known as orphines — chemically distinct from fentanyl and from nitazenes despite the similar-sounding name. The Center for Forensic Science Research and Education first detected the drug in the U.S. and several European countries in 2024; Canada reported its first detection by September 2025. Laboratory data suggest it may be roughly 10 times as potent as fentanyl, though no published human pharmacological data confirm that estimate. It has also turned up as a contaminant in counterfeit pills marketed as Xanax, Percocet, Dilaudid and OxyContin, and — separately from this case — in fake Lion’s Mane supplements seized elsewhere in July 2026.
Toxicology results for the teen showed cychlorphine along with another synthetic opioid, N-desethyl isotonitazene, and ethyl bromazolam, a benzodiazepine not approved by the FDA; fentanyl was not detected in his system, according to the San Francisco Department of Public Health. Separately, some of the pills seized in this month’s raids did test positive for fentanyl among other substances, according to the Epoch Times — a finding from the September seizure, not from the April toxicology results, and not established to be connected to the teen’s death. The department has warned that standard fentanyl test strips cannot detect cychlorphine and that “even a fraction of a counterfeit pill can kill someone.”
A gap in the law
The DEA published a temporary order placing cychlorphine in Schedule I on Aug. 27, following a July 1 notice of intent to schedule it and three related opioids. The order lasts two years and can be extended up to one additional year while permanent scheduling proceeds. State law has not caught up: Jenkins said cychlorphine is not yet listed as a controlled substance under California’s Health and Safety Code, which she said limits prosecutors’ ability to hold suppliers accountable even after arrests like these.
Detection lagging behind
San Francisco’s wastewater drug-monitoring program lost federal funding in 2024 and resumed in July 2026, with public reporting planned this fall. Stanford psychiatry professor Keith Humphreys has said wastewater monitoring can help officials identify emerging drugs before they begin causing deaths.
National reporting on cychlorphine’s death toll varies by source and date, and outlets have not converged on a single figure: a Tennessee-based forensic center linked 63 deaths to the drug in earlier reporting cited by Medical Daily, cautioning that its elevated count partly reflects early, targeted testing since routine toxicology screens do not detect the substance; other figures reported over the course of 2026 have ranged from roughly 19 confirmed deaths in an East Tennessee cluster as of March to more than 50 in later tallies, a White House notice on April 30 citing at least 55 U.S. deaths, and a United Nations report on May 14 identifying 78 fatal overdoses and 182 seizure reports across 10 countries. The San Francisco case marks a confirmed death on the West Coast involving a teenage victim and a criminal investigation that identified suspected sources of the pills.
Warning signs and resources
Dr. Hillary Kunins, the city’s director of behavioral health services, said no other local deaths had been reported as of mid-September but cautioned that naloxone — sold over the counter as Narcan — is not always effective against cychlorphine with a single dose. City health officials say the greatest risk falls on teens and young adults who obtain pills from friends, dealers or social media, and on anyone who assumes a pill is safe because it resembles a prescription drug; a negative fentanyl test strip result does not rule out cychlorphine.
Officials list warning signs of an opioid overdose as slow or stopped breathing, blue or gray lips, pinpoint pupils, gurgling sounds and unresponsiveness. Because a single dose of naloxone may not be enough, officials advise keeping more than one on hand and calling 911 even if a person appears to respond. San Francisco residents can reach the health department’s treatment line at 888-246-3333; the national SAMHSA helpline is 1-800-662-4357.
What’s next
Police said they will continue following leads from the investigation, and officials have not said how widely cychlorphine may be circulating in San Francisco. As with any criminal case, Pitts, Lamare, Wallace and Hyson are presumed innocent unless and until convicted in court. The case remains under active investigation as test results and court proceedings continue.
Compiled from reporting by: San Francisco Police Department, San Francisco Department of Public Health, San Francisco District Attorney’s Office, DEA, Medical Daily, San Francisco Chronicle, ABC7 San Francisco, NBC Bay Area, CBS San Francisco, The Voice of San Francisco, KRON4, the Epoch Times and OANN.
