ELIZABETH CITY, N.C. — Thursday, an Elizabeth City man was sentenced to 90 months in prison after being convicted of intent to distribute Fentanyl.
He was also convicted of possessing a firearm as a convicted felon, and aiding and abetting in the intent to distribute Fentanyl.
A release from the US Attorney for the Eastern District of North Carolina, Robert Higdon, Jr., said this was not Yakim Paige's first drug felony.
Paige was on probation after serving time for firearm, drug and assault charges when police arrested him for having Fentanyl.
Investigators got a tip that he was distributing heroin, and put him under surveillance. They saw Paige participate in what appeared to be a drug deal while wearing a single-strap black bag, and alerted his probation officer.
Paige's probation team searched Paige's apartment later that day, and found the black bag. Inside, there was a gun, a scale, and four bags of Fentanyl mixed with ANPP, according to the DOJ.
In other areas of the apartment, officers reported finding a second gun, ammunition, a second digital scale, and more than 90 wax bags associated with drug distribution.
There were two other people in the apartment with Paige, and officers collected eight plastic bags of a powder substance from their pockets.
"Altogether, officers seized over 42 grams of substance containing ANPP and Fentanyl," the DOJ wrote.
The release said Paige's arrest was part of the Project Safe Neighborhoods initiative, and Elizabeth City Police Department, the Pasquotank County Sheriff’s Office, the N.C. Department of Public Safety and the Federal Bureau of Investigation worked together on the investigation.
