Appeals court throws out murder charge in toddler's fentanyl death
Judges said a man accused of supplying drugs to a 19-month-old's parents was too far removed from her death to be charged with murder.
A state appeals court has thrown out a murder charge against a man accused of supplying fentanyl to his housemates, the parents of a 19-month-old Santa Clara County girl who died in 2023, according to an opinion filed Monday.
The Sixth District Court of Appeal, which hears appeals from Santa Clara and nearby counties, ruled 3-0 that the man's role in providing drugs to the parents was "too remote" from their own life-endangering conduct to support a murder charge, despite what the judges called "clear evidence" of his conscious disregard for human life.
Prosecutors had charged him with implied malice murder, which in California means a death caused by a knowingly dangerous act, even without intent to kill. The girl died Aug. 12, 2023, of combined fentanyl and methamphetamine toxicity, the opinion says.
The court ordered the trial court to dismiss the murder count. The man still faces charges of felony child endangerment and possession of fentanyl for sale, and has not been convicted. A jury convicted both parents of second-degree murder while the appeal was pending, the opinion says.
Source: Sixth District Court of Appeal opinion, case H053303, filed Nov. 2, 2026.