300K 'Rainbow Fentanyl' Pills Seized From NYC Abode: Feds

NEW YORK CITY — A 300,000-pill cache of "rainbow fentanyl" was seized from a Bronx apartment during a bust that saw one accused dealer clinging to a windowsill with no fire escape, authorities announced Wednesday.

Erickson Lorenzo, 30, and Jefry Rodriguez-Pichardo, 32, face multiple drug charges after the Oct. 7 bust near the Bronx River Parkway that uncovered about $9 million worth of fentanyl and a gun, according to the city's Special Narcotics Prosecutor's office.

"Creating these rainbow-colored pills out of a deadly drug – that is taking so many lives in the Bronx and around the city – is yet another dark marketing tool used by drug traffickers," said Bronx District Attorney Darcel Clark.

During the bust, investigators found fentanyl pills worth up to $6 million, 22 pounds of powdered fentanyl worth about $3 million and a Tec-9 semi-automatic firearm, according to Special Narcotics Prosecutor Bridget G. Brennan.

The Bronx bust eclipses the 15,000 pills of brightly colored "rainbow fentanyl" pills found last week in a LEGO box in what authorities then called the largest such bust in the city.

While drug enforcement officials warn "rainbow fentanyl" is a deliberate tactic to target children, experts say otherwise.

Dealers have long used colors, stamps and other markers as a kind of illicit drug marketing tactic, according to an NPR report.

Sen. Chuck Schumer's recent claim that the rainbow-colored drugs were meant to resemble candy in time for Halloween was also disputed by Joseph Palamar, an associate professor at NYU Langone Health, in a conversation with Newsweek.

Likewise, Maya Doe Simkins, co-founder of the Opioid Safety and Naloxone Network and co-director of Remedy Alliance, shot down claims the pills were targeted at children in an interview with CNN.

"It has nothing to do with marketing to kids at all, period, whatsoever," Simkins reportedly said.

Simkins' comment was also featured in "Last Week Tonight With John Oliver," which was delivered with a healthy dose of skepticism and snark.

"Which does make sense, doesn't it?," Oliver said. "Because kids, and this is true, are not an ideal costumer base for expensive street drugs."

But the seized fentanyl still presented a danger to the wider public, prosecutors noted, as some of the pills found resembled "legitimate" oxycodone and Xanax.