A Mexican man plans to change his plea on drug charges for allegedly selling pentobarbital for use in committing suicide – in some cases, authorities found his customers dead.
Pentobarbital is a short-acting barbiturate rarely used outside of hospitals. The drug is used in animal euthanasia, assisted suicide and some U.S. executions.
Prosecutors charged Daniel Gonzalez-Munguia, also known as “Alejandro Vasquez,” of Puebla, Mexico, with importing and distributing a controlled substance.
Gonzalez-Munguia initially entered a plea of not guilty in July.
Judge Sara Ellis set a change of plea hearing for Jan. 10, 2025, and ordered that a draft plea agreement be submitted to her before that.
Prosecutors said Gonzalez-Munguia operated an online business to sell pentobarbital to people contemplating suicide.
Homeland Security started an investigation into the smuggling of suicide drugs in March 2016 after finding pentobarbital in an intercepted package from Mexico that contained two pre-packaged, 100 milliliter medicine bottles, each labelled as “pentobarbital sodium” sold under the trade name “Pisabental.”
Pentobarbital is sold commercially in Mexico for euthanizing animals. The intercepted package, which also contained the anti-nausea medicine metoclopramide, was headed to a hotel in Libertyville, Illinois, about 50 miles from Chicago.
Prosecutors said Gonzalez-Munguia advised users to take the anti-nausea medicine before drinking the pentobarbital. He also asked users to delete his emails before taking the drug, according to court records.
During the investigation, authorities located mail parcels that appear to have been shipped out of Mexico by Gonzalez-Munguia. Authorities in the U.S. and several foreign countries conducted well-being checks and recovered pentobarbital from people who admitted to being despondent and ordering the suicide drug online from email addresses operated by Gonzalez-Munguia, according to the indictment and a criminal complaint previously filed in the case. Law enforcement offered assistance to those people. In other instances, people who bought pentobarbital via the email addresses were found dead.
The 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline is available 24/7 by phone and online.
