A pair of alleged drug dealers have been charged with fatally dosing two Manhattan college students with fentanyl — and for raping one of the young women after she fell unconscious, officials said Thursday.
Suspect Moises Freire, 19, told Brian Peralta Cabrera, 18, that he wanted to feed the two victims drugs that were strong enough to “last the entire night” in the hopes of getting both women addicted to narcotics, calling it a “win-win scenario,” federal prosecutors said in a superseding indictment against the two men.
“This case alleges not only the deadly distribution of fentanyl to two young women but also the sexual assault of a victim rendered defenseless by that poisoning,” U.S. Attorney Jamie McDonald said Thursday in announcing the new indictment.
When Freire gave the victims the fentanyl-laced drugs on March 18, he told the two women it was pure cocaine when it was fentanyl, federal prosecutors said. Both women almost immediately lost consciousness after taking the drugs. It was then that Freire raped one of the victims in her dorm room, officials said.
The feds said the overdoses happened in a dorm room of a Manhattan college, but wouldn’t say which one.
Freire waited for 45 minutes after the women fell unconscious before alerting campus security, prosecutors said. In the meantime, he took pictures of them as they lay unconscious, which he shared with his friends.
One of the women regained consciousness after receiving life-saving treatment, but the woman Freire raped died of complications caused by acute fentanyl intoxication four days later.
A toxicology test later confirmed that both women had fentanyl, but no cocaine, in their systems.
Freire was arrested later that day, while Peralta Cabrera was apprehended on March 24.
Both men are charged in the superseding indictment with conspiracy to distribute a controlled substance resulting in death, which carries a mandatory minimum sentence of 20 years in prison and a maximum sentence of life in prison.
Freire is additionally charged with distribution of a controlled substance resulting in death and serious bodily injury as well as distribution of a controlled substance with the intent to commit rape.
Freire’s bail application was denied after his initial arrest in April, and he remains in custody, officials said. Cabrera is out on a $75K bond, home detention with location monitoring
Freire lives in the Bronx, while Peralta Cabrera lives in Queens, officials said.