Back in 2015, Roanoke police chief Chris Perkins, forty-six, knew immediately fentanyl was going to be a game changer. It meant more teenagers would be drawn to the ever-potent blends, able to get high simply by snorting the drug and avoiding the stigma new users have about injecting and, later, the telltale track marks. It meant some would buy counterfeit pills that were sold to them as Xanax or oxycodone but were actually fentanyl.
