Brewster state rep Tim Whelan and Salem state rep Paul Tucker have filed legislation to add carfentanil to the state’s controlled substances and drug trafficking laws.
Whelan and Tucker’s bill, HD3970, would classify the elephant tranquilizer and its derivatives as a Class-A controlled substance with 5 grams or more being subject to the criminal drug trafficking statute punishable by up to 20 years in prison.
Carfentanil is 50-to-100 times more potent than Fentanyl and 10,000 times more potent than morphine. Studies have shown that as little as 20 micrograms of the synthetic drug can kill a human.
Whelan and Tucker, who co-sponsored legislation in 2015 to add Fentanyl to the list of Class-B drugs subject to prosecution under the state’s narcotics trafficking laws, said they filed the carfentanil bill in an effort to be proactive in keeping Massachusetts ahead of the “ever changing and dangerous scourge” of synthetic narcotics.