Five men have been arrested and indicted over the 2023 overdose death of Robert De Niro’s grandson, 19-year-old Leandro De Niro-Rodriguez, after a federal investigation alleged a social-media-fuelled network supplied thousands of counterfeit pills laced with fentanyl to teenagers and young adults across New York City. Prosecutors said the defendants — identified as Bruce Epperson, Eddie Barreto, Grant McIver, and brothers John and Roy Nicolas — conspired to distribute controlled substances that caused the deaths of three 19-year-olds within a matter of weeks in the summer of 2023, including De Niro-Rodriguez and Akira Stein, the daughter of Blondie co-founder Chris Stein. Each is charged with conspiracy to distribute and possess with intent to distribute fentanyl, para-fluorofentanyl and alprazolam resulting in death, a felony that carries a mandatory minimum of 20 years in prison if convicted.
Authorities said the group marketed and sold counterfeit prescription opioids via mainstream social platforms and encrypted messaging apps, reaching buyers far beyond their own neighbourhoods. In court documents and public statements, investigators described a pattern in which the defendants allegedly pushed pills represented as oxycodone or Xanax that in fact contained fentanyl, a synthetic opioid up to 50 times stronger than heroin. The case file ties the network’s activities to a cluster of fatal overdoses among teenagers, alleging that the pills linked to the five men had “deadly consequences” across a three-month span.
The arrests were executed in multiple jurisdictions. According to the Drug Enforcement Administration’s New York Division, Epperson was taken into custody in Troy, New York, and McIver was arrested in Houston, Texas. John Nicolas was arrested in Buffalo, New York, and his brother Roy in Valley Stream on Long Island; Barreto surrendered in Manhattan. All five have made initial court appearances. Prosecutors allege the network’s sales were orchestrated and amplified online, with buyers contacted or cultivated on apps popular with teenagers, then directed to hand-to-hand exchanges.
Law enforcement officials said the investigation followed the sequence of three teen deaths in 2023: a 19-year-old woman who warned one defendant after surviving an overdose that a supplied batch might be “extra strong,” only to die in a subsequent incident; Stein, who died two weeks later; and De Niro-Rodriguez, who died less than a month after that. The timeline, outlined in federal filings and summarised publicly, forms the backbone of the conspiracy-resulting-in-death charge and reflects the government’s contention that the defendants knew or should have known about the lethal potency of the counterfeit pills they continued to sell.