09-05-2025
Alleged South Lake Tahoe drug dealer linked to 2024 fentanyl overdose deaths indicted in federal court
SOUTH LAKE TAHOE — An alleged drug dealer arrested in connection with four deadly overdoses in South Lake Tahoe was indicted in federal court, prosecutors said Thursday.
At the end of April, the FBI announced that South Lake Tahoe resident Timothy Austin Pannell, 31, had been taken into custody, more than a year after four people — three men and one woman — died and a fifth person survived from fentanyl overdoses. The deaths occurred on February 12, 2024.
Pannell was formally charged on Thursday with distribution of fentanyl causing death, the U.S. Attorney's Office's Eastern District of California announced.
The U.S. Attorney's Office alleges that two of the men who died had met with Pannell in a church parking lot the night before to purchase what they thought was cocaine, but later turned out to be fentanyl. The two men then returned home and shared what they had purchased with three others.
Pannell faces anywhere from 20 years to life in prison if he is convicted, prosecutors said. He also faces a $1 million fine.
