Sacramento Man Pleads Guilty for Role in Shipping Half-a-Million Fentanyl Pills Across the United States a result of Homeland Security Task Force

SACRAMENTO, Calif. - Marcus Miller, 36, of Sacramento, pleaded guilty Thursday to 15 counts of drug trafficking offenses and one count of being a felon in possession of a firearm, U.S. Attorney Eric Grant announced.

According to court documents, Miller and his fellow conspirators shipped hundreds of thousands of fentanyl pills around the country for more than a year. On several occasions, law enforcement seized packages shipped by Miller, Jones, and their co-conspirators, and found fentanyl pills, often hidden inside children's toys. In total, law enforcement seized approximately 450,000 fentanyl pills connected to the conspiracy through seized shipments and search warrants. Based on additional evidence, law enforcement estimates that members of the conspiracy have shipped more than one million fentanyl pills to customers in several different states.

During searches connected to the conspiracy, agents found hundreds of thousands of fentanyl pills, more than $80,000 in cash, and 17 firearms. Some of the pills and a firearm were hidden inside a secret compartment in Miller's vehicle. Miller is prohibited from possessing firearms because of prior felony convictions that include burglary, carrying a loaded firearm, carrying a loaded concealed weapon, and convictions in 2009, 2017, and 2020 of being felon in possession of a firearm.

Miller is scheduled to be sentenced by U.S. District Judge Daniel J. Calabretta on Oct. 8, 2026. Miller faces a mandatory sentence of at least 10 years in prison, a maximum statutory penalty of life in prison and a $10 million fine. The actual sentence, however, will be determined at the discretion of the court after consideration of any applicable statutory factors and the Federal Sentencing Guidelines, which take into account a number of variables.

This case is part of the Homeland Security Task Force (HSTF) initiative established by Executive Order 14159, Protecting the American People Against Invasion. The HSTF is a whole-of-government partnership dedicated to eliminating criminal cartels, foreign gangs, transnational criminal organizations, and human smuggling and trafficking rings operating in the United States and abroad. Through historic interagency collaboration, the HSTF directs the full might of United States law enforcement towards identifying, investigating, and prosecuting the full spectrum of crimes committed by these organizations, which have long fueled violence and instability within our borders. In performing this work, the HSTF places special emphasis on investigating and prosecuting those engaged in child trafficking or other crimes involving children. The HSTF further utilizes all available tools to prosecute and remove the most violent criminal aliens from the United States. HSTF Sacramento is composed of agents and officers from Homeland Security Investigations, the U.S. Postal Inspection Service; the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives; the Federal Bureau of Investigation; the Drug Enforcement Administration, the Northern California High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area, the Central Valley High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area, and the Sacramento County Sheriff's Office with the prosecution being led by the United States Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of California.

The Sacramento Police Department, the Folsom Police Department, the U.S. Marshals Service, and the Citrus Heights Police Department assisted in the investigation. Assistant U.S. Attorney Ross Pearson is prosecuting the case.