Louisiana man gets 5 years in prison for counterfeit fentanyl pills found at Laredo hotel

LAREDO, Tex. (KGNS) – A Louisiana man has been sentenced to five years in prison after being caught with more than 2,000 counterfeit fentanyl pills at a hotel in Laredo, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Texas.

Walter Wellington Somers, 41, of Lake Charles, pleaded guilty in April to a charge of conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute more than 40 grams of fentanyl.

On July 22, U.S. District Judge Keith P. Ellison ordered Somers to serve 60 months in federal prison, followed by four years of supervised release. Prosecutors said Somers had a long record of arrests and planned to take the drugs back to Louisiana to sell for more money.

Authorities said the case began Dec. 23, 2023, when staff at the Embassy Suites Hotel in Laredo found what looked like drugs in a room while cleaning. They called police, who showed up and saw Somers trying to get back into the room. He told them he had broken a TV and came back to pay for it.

Inside the room, police found a silver bag full of small blue pills marked with “M-30.” A test later showed they contained fentanyl. In total, there were 2,319 pills. The pills were traced back to Sinaloa, Mexico, investigators said.

DEA officials said just two milligrams of fentanyl can be deadly.

“DEA’s work in this case helped save lives,” said DEA Acting Special Agent in Charge William Kimbell. “Somers had thousands of fake pills that could have hurt many people in the Laredo area.”

Investigators said Somers had traveled from Louisiana to meet a friend in South Texas. In messages between the two, they talked about collecting money and getting drugs. In one voice message, Somers was told that if he sent $700 or $800, someone would front them 3,000 pills. The friend also sent a video showing bags of the same kind of pills found in the hotel.

Somers will stay in custody until he is moved to a federal prison.

The Drug Enforcement Administration and Laredo Police Department worked on the case. It was prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorneys Steven Chamberlin and Brittany Jensen.

The case was part of an Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Forces (OCDETF) investigation, which targets major drug operations in the U.S.

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