Synthetic Opioids | Online Store Linked to Two Fatal Overdoses

Merchants of death were reportedly arrested in Montreal on Tuesday. The Press was able to confirm that police had hit a popular online opioid store linked to two fatal overdoses, including that of Mathis Boivin, the teenager whose fate moved Quebec last winter. One of the suspects, known for attracting customers with free samples, was on parole at the time of his arrest.

As soon as the suspects were nabbed, the Montreal Police Department (SPVM) contacted Mathis’ father, Christian Boivin, who has been hoping for news since his son’s death in December 2023. The results of the nine-month investigation into the tragic event were communicated to him first.

“It brings a balm, absolutely. It’s an emotional day. What’s good is that we continue to talk about Mathis, we raise awareness so that young people understand that it’s dangerous and that they can die,” he said afterwards.

Mr. Boivin highlighted the work accomplished by investigators. “They are doing their job. It is not an easy job,” he added.

The two suspects arrested are aged 17 and 24. They will be charged with drug trafficking and possession of drugs for the purpose of trafficking. The charges do not concern causing the death of a person, for the moment. In addition to Mathis Boivin, the search for The Press demonstrate that the same network supplied the narcotics involved in the fatal overdose of Nikian Levesque-Vanny, 19, who died on May 25 in Montreal (see other text).

According to our sources, investigators suspect that the online drug store that the suspects are accused of operating could be linked to other overdoses, not necessarily fatal.

“The type of narcotics seized today are substances that cause overdoses, which are extremely dangerous for public health. So, is it possible? Anything is possible,” acknowledged Commander Yannick Desmarais, of the SPVM’s South Criminal Investigation Division.

“Hence the importance of getting these tablets off the street,” he adds.

On Instagram and Telegram

On the online platforms Instagram and Telegram, the store operated under the name “Kushtard,” a play on words between a strain of cannabis (kush) and the well-known convenience store chain Couche-Tard, which has nothing to do with the criminals and whose logo was even used. The store boasted that it was open “from noon to midnight.”

The dealers who controlled the accounts regularly sent their hundreds of subscribers screenshots of new arrivals for home delivery: cannabis, ketamine, counterfeit pills imitating Xanax, Dilaudid or OxyContin, screenshots obtained by The Press.

In reality, according to what the SPVM found, the tablets sold often contained nitazenes, powerful synthetic opioids that can be fatal even in small quantities. In April, Public Health issued an alert to the Montreal population regarding the “significant” circulation of tablets containing nitazenes “up to 25 times more powerful” than fentanyl.

Searches conducted during Tuesday’s raid on homes and a vehicle resulted in the seizure of hundreds of “pharmaceutical-looking” opioid tablets, according to the SPVM. The online store is now under police surveillance and further arrests remain possible if accomplices attempt to reactivate it.

Hard to prove

Mathis Boivin, 15, had bought pills at the Kushtard store shortly before last Christmas. The blue pills looked like OxyContin pills, but contained molecules from the nitazene family. The night he died, he ate with his family, then went to bed. He took a pill and died in his room.

“I was three metres away from him, in the house. It doesn’t make sense… You’re right next to your child,” lamented Christian Boivin, in an interview with columnist Patrick Lagacé last January.¹The father’s testimony had made the rounds of Quebec, on social networks and on the show Everyone is talking about itprovoking a societal reflection on the dangers of new synthetic drugs.

As soon as the teenager died, SPVM investigators began tracking down Kushtard. It is difficult to pin down this type of dealer hidden behind social media accounts. Even if the police can demonstrate that a suspect frequently acts as an administrator of the “store,” it must be demonstrated that it was indeed the suspect who acted during a specific transaction, and not another person who had access to the account.

“It’s the same principle as online fraud. Try to prove who was on the keyboard…” Mr. Boivin said on Tuesday.

To build their evidence, the investigators sent an undercover agent who was accepted as a client of the network and made purchases from the suspects, according to our sources.

“It was very difficult, because it’s a very closed network. We deployed a ton of investigative techniques. It’s a case that was extremely close to our hearts, at the SPVM and my investigators. I’m a father, like my employees, we all have feelings about it,” says Commander Yannick Desmarais.

The police had to go through a long process to prove who was managing the targeted social media accounts. A request to the company Meta to know a user’s IP address easily takes 30 days. Once the IP address is obtained, a request to a Quebec internet provider to obtain a subscriber’s contact information often takes an additional 30 days, according to our information.

Police requests to Telegram, however, mostly go unheeded. The social network, based in Dubai and the British Virgin Islands, is known for fiercely protecting the anonymity of its users. It collaborates little with the authorities. Its CEO, Paval Durov, is facing criminal charges in France for controlling a platform that facilitates illegal transactions and refusing to cooperate with the justice system.

Already convicted of the same crime

The identity of the 17-year-old suspect arrested Tuesday is being protected because he is a minor. As for the 24-year-old suspect, he is Laxshan Mylvaganam, a man who had been identified as early as 2022 by several SPVM informants as one of the biggest drug dealers in the city, according to court documents filed at the Montreal courthouse.

“I have represented the individual before. He was arrested this afternoon on charges of possession of narcotics. As for the fact that a teenager died from an overdose, I have no information to that effect,” he told The Press The suspect’s lawyer, Mr.^e Gary Martin.

Also in 2022, Laxshan Mylvaganam was arrested thanks to undercover officers who posed as customers. During two transactions, while the customer did not ask for opioids, he gave them free pills as a “bonus.”

“The first freebies were Dilaudid and Oxycodone, two powerful and highly addictive opioids. The second freebies were Xanax and Dilaudid,” Judge Dennis Galiatsatos noted at the bail hearing.

The judge found the situation “alarming” and spoke of a strategy to create addiction among consumers and encourage them to come back to buy more pills. The suspect was arrested with an “exorbitant” amount of drugs, including nitazene pills, as well as a loaded handgun, the magistrate noted. “This is a high-level drug trafficking operation, lucrative and socially devastating,” he wrote in his decision.

The judge also noted that the accused was not a drug user, but was only seeking to “profit off the backs of drug addicts.”

In the same case, Laxshan Mylvaganam then pleaded guilty to a series of charges in May 2022, before a different judge, and was sentenced to two years and nine months in prison.

As required by law, he was released automatically after serving two-thirds of his sentence, in December 2023.

Before the Parole Board of Canada, he explained that he had received the Canada Emergency Response Benefit (CERB) during the pandemic. “You indicate that you became accustomed to this idle lifestyle. It was during this period that you became involved in drug trafficking,” the commissioners noted.

In releasing him, the commission had imposed a series of conditions on him, including avoiding criminal associations, allowing authorities to monitor all of his cell phone and social media communications, providing detailed financial statements to authorities and remaining transparent about his activities. He had agreed.

If we are to believe the investigators who arrested him on Tuesday, he did not keep his word.

With Caroline Touzin, The Press

1. Read “I was ten feet away from him, in the house”