The 19-year-old grandson of Robert De Niro, Leandro De Niro Rodriguezwas found dead in his Manhattan apartment on July 2, and an investigation into his cause of death has been underway ever since.

The New York Police arrested a 20-year-old girl, who is alleged to be a drug dealer and who sold drugs to the young man, shortly before he was found dead, according to international media.

Sofia Haley Marks, known as the “Percocet Princess,” is accused of drug trafficking. The police believe that the death of 19-year-old Leandro is due to an overdose, after a white powdery substance was found near his lifeless body, as reported by the “New York Post”.

A few days ago, Leandro’s mother, Drena De Niro, wrote on social media that her son died after being sold fentanyl pills. The synthetic opioid fentanyl, a legal prescription painkiller, is now a black market product. Cheap, up to 100 times more potent than natural opioids, it’s just as deadly.

Fentanyl is mainly manufactured in China, which ships it either whole or in the form of raw ingredients (called precursors) to Mexico. That’s where it’s picked up by the cartels, according to Ben Westhoff, author of “Fentanyl, Inc. How Rogue Chemists Created the Deadliest Wave of the Opioid Epidemic”.

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The person who sold her son the adulterated drugs did so knowingly, Drena De Niro claimed, writing, “Someone sold him pills laced with fentanyl, which he knew were adulterated, but sold them to him anyway.”

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