Cincinnati fentanyl dealer sentenced to 18 years in federal ...

CINCINNATI - A local multi-kilogram drug trafficker - who was captured on camera in February 2024 shooting a rival fentanyl dealer repeatedly in the chest, after losing a bet over who sold more potent fentanyl - was sentenced in U.S. District Court today to 216 months in prison.

According to court documents, Robert Lee Howard, 34, of Cincinnati, was primarily a multi-kilogram dealer of fentanyl, but also sold cocaine, methamphetamine and marijuana.

In June 2024, agents recorded the defendant advising he was waiting on 23 pounds of methamphetamine to come in the mail in five separate packages. Agents intercepted one of those packages and discovered it contained more than four kilograms of 96 percent pure crystal meth.

That same month, Howard's car was shot up while he was driving around Cincinnati. The next day, he was recorded on calls offering to pay $10,000 total for "friends from Chicago" to come to Cincinnati and solve his "problem" by "putting [the rival fentanyl dealer] on a T-shirt."

Agents then executed a search warrant at Howard's primary residence in Price Hill - where four young children also lived - and arrested him. At Howard's home, they discovered more than nine kilograms of fentanyl, cocaine, an industrial size pill press, press parts and other supplies for making fake "ecstasy" pills with fentanyl, body armor, ammunition and AK-47 magazines. Howard had multiple firearms lying out on his bedroom floor amongst scattered vials of fentanyl, including a Mini Draco style rifle and two pistols with extended magazines.

Howard was charged by federal criminal complaint in June 2024 and pleaded guilty in July 2025.

Dominick S. Gerace II, United States Attorney for the Southern District of Ohio; Joseph O. Dixon, Special Agent in Charge, Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) Detroit; West Chester Police Chief Brian Rebholz; Cincinnati Interim Police Chief Adam Hennie; Jorge Rosendo, Special Agent in Charge, U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms & Explosives (ATF); and Lesley Allison, Inspector in Charge, U.S. Postal Inspection Service (USPIS), Pittsburgh Division; announced the sentence imposed by U.S. District Court Judge Jeffery P. Hopkins. Assistant United States Attorney David P. Dornette is representing the United States in this case.

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