Robert Johnson Jr.Cuyahoga County Sheriff’s Department
CLEVELAND, Ohio — A Cleveland man whose attorney admitted on Tuesday that his client sold fentanyl to a woman who overdosed and died in August 2015 will stand trial this week.
Despite this admission, Robert Johnson Jr. is arguing that he should be found not guilty because he said the fentanyl is not what killed Kimberly Ferline.
Johnson, 27, was indicted in March 2016 on two counts distribution of fentanyl, one of which contains a death specification. Johnson sold the drug on Aug. 25 and 27, and prosecutors say the dose he sold on Aug. 25 killed the 46-year-old.
A jury was picked Tuesday morning in U.S. District Judge Patricia Gaughan’s courtroom.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Vasile Katsaros told the jury that Ferline was found passed out in the bathtub of her home. She died later that day at Fairview Hospital, and the Cuyahoga County Medical Examiner said she died of acute intoxication of fentanyl and diazepam, Katsaros said.
Katsaros said that witnesses will testify that Johnson, also known as “Pop,” frequently called and texted with Carl Laucher, Ferline’s boyfriend, and that Laucher bought drugs from Johnson. The prosecutor said that after Ferline overdosed, Laucher worked with investigators and purchased drugs from Johnson for a controlled buy.
Katsaros said Johnson and his wife were then pulled over and arrested, and Johnson admitted to dealing drugs.
And Mack admitted to nearly all of this in his opening statement. He said, though, that “this case is not whether or not he sold drugs.”
In order to convict Johnson, a jury must find that Ferline would have died “but for” the presence of fentanyl in her system.
Mack said he will present an expert that contradicts the findings of the Cuyahoga County Medical Examiner and show the dose of fentanyl Ferline took was not lethal. He also told the jury that Johnson had no relationship with Ferline.
Mack said when all the evidence is presented, jurors will have “more questions than you will answers to the cause of (Ferline’s) death.”
Laucher was supposed to testify in the trial but died of an overdose on Jan. 25, Katsaros said.
He urged the jury to think rationally when listening to all the evidence.
“Don’t leave your common sense at the door in this case,” Katsaros told the jury.
The trial is expected to finish this week.
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