Rhode Island man sentenced to prison after thousands fentanyl-laced pills nearly 9 kilograms of powder fentanyl seized

PROVIDENCE – Jorge Pimentel, a/k/a “Big Head,” 36, of Cranston, has been sentenced to twenty years in federal prison, announced Acting United States Attorney Sara Miron Bloom.

Pimental previously admitted to a federal judge that he ran a highly productive drug lab and a stash house in Pawtucket from which 19,315 fentanyl-laced pills made to resemble pharmaceutical grade Percocet pills and nearly 9 kilograms of powder fentanyl were seized by law enforcement.  The seizure of a combined total of over sixteen kilograms of fentanyl-laced pills and fentanyl powder, an industrial grade high-speed pill press, and twenty-eight thousand grams of cutting agents used in the manufacturer of the fake pill seized in September 2023, is among the largest seizures of fentanyl in Rhode Island. The fentanyl powder and already cut mixture seized in this case represented the potential production of more than 633,000 fentanyl-laced pills.

Court documents detail that Pimentel was already a “well-established, large scale fentanyl trafficker” when, on multiple occasions between May 31, 2023, and September 29, 2023, he brokered sales of a total of approximately 34,000 fentanyl-laced pills for which he was paid $37,000.

Pimentel was sentenced on Tuesday by U.S. District Court Chief Judge John J. McConnell, Jr., to 240 months of incarceration to be followed by five years of federal supervised release. He pleaded guilty in December 2024 as charged by indictment with conspiracy to distribute and possess with intent to distribute fentanyl, and possession with intent to distribute fentanyl. No plea agreement was filed in this case.

The case was prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorneys Stacey A. Erickson and Taylor Dean.

The matter was investigated by the FBI’s Rhode Island Safe Streets Task Force. The Safe Streets Task Force consists of agents and law enforcement officers from the FBI, Rhode Island State Police, the Cranston, Woonsocket, Pawtucket, West Warwick, and Central Falls Police Departments, the U.S. Marshals Service, and the Rhode Island Department of Corrections.

The United States Attorney’s Office thanks the Providence Police Department and the DEA for their partnership.

This case is part of Project Safe Neighborhoods (PSN), a program bringing together all levels of law enforcement and the communities they serve to reduce violent crime and gun violence, and to make our neighborhoods safer for everyone.