Alex Riggins
The San Diego Union-Tribune
(TNS)
A former Riverside County firefighter who became addicted to drugs after a training injury was sentenced Friday to more than 17 years in federal prison for selling a deadly dose of fentanyl to a San Diego father.
David Michael Busse, 33, pleaded guilty in May to a fentanyl distribution conspiracy charge related to the May 2021 death of Brook Jacoby, 35. On Friday, U.S. District Judge Cynthia Bashant sentenced Busse to 17 years and six months in prison.
Vanessa Lanae Lathan, a 31-year-old Spring Valley resident, and her then-boyfriend, 36-year-old Valley Center resident Roger Bionogers Santiago, also pleaded guilty in the case, admitting that they delivered the fatal dose of fentanyl to Jacoby on Busse's behalf.
Bashant on Friday sentenced Lathan to five years and eight months in prison, and Santiago to six years and six months in prison.
According to records in the case, San Diego police officers found Jacoby dead from an overdose at the kitchen table of his San Diego apartment. According to prosecutors, Jacoby had an 11-month-old daughter at the time and had proposed to his girlfriend five days earlier.
Investigators searching his phone discovered messages between Jacoby and Busse setting up the fentanyl sale. The messages indicated Jacoby had previously been addicted to heroin and sought out fentanyl on the "OfferUp" app. "Honestly, I have been clean for a few months," he messaged Busse. His messages indicated that he'd never before used fentanyl, and that he was concerned about doing so.
The messages also indicated Busse was aware how strong the drug was, and he asked Jacoby if he had the overdose-reversing medication Naloxone nearby "just in case."
After discovering the messages between the two men, investigators used Jacoby's phone to set up another drug purchase from Busse, according to court records. When Lathan and Santiago showed up to once again deliver the drugs, authorities arrested them.
Lathan allowed investigators to use her phone to communicate with Busse and set up a meeting at a Mission Viejo gas station, according to court records. When Busse arrived, police arrested him.
According to documents submitted ahead of sentencing, each of the defendants was also a drug user, and Lathan and Santiago were clients of Busse's who received small discounts on their own purchases in exchange for delivering the drugs to Jacoby. They each expressed remorse for Jacoby's death.
Lathan was a preschool teacher at the time with no prior criminal record, has completed drug rehabilitation and is due to give birth to a daughter next month, her attorney wrote in a sentencing memorandum urging a home-confinement sentence.
" Santiago was struggling with debilitating, life consuming drug addiction" at the time of his arrest, his attorney wrote. "Every decision he made at the time was fueled by a physiological need for drugs."
Busse's attorney wrote that his client grew up in Orange County idolizing firefighters. He became an EMT after graduating high school in 2008, and the next year he joined the Riverside County Fire Department.
"Unfortunately, Mr. Busse's dream job was cut short in 2014," his attorney wrote. "During a training exercise, the roof gave way and Mr. Busse fell nearly three stories on his back."
The broken vertebrae left him in a medically induced coma and ended his firefighting career, according to his attorney. The hospital stay and the drugs administered to him also sparked his addiction to opioids, which led to a life of petty crime related to drug use and intoxication.
Busse was working as a bartender at the time of his arrest and selling drugs to help support his own habit, according to his attorney. In a pre-sentence report, he expressed deep regret and remorse for Jacoby's death.
"It is very clear that (Busse) recognized the potential — if not inevitable — consequences of continuing to deal this deadly drug," Acting U.S. Attorney Andrew Haden said in a statement. "Because of his callous actions, another life has met the tragic end that fentanyl brings, and a family has lost its father, fiancé, son and brother."
This story originally appeared in San Diego Union-Tribune.
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