Dealer who sold fentanyl-laced cocaine to West Point cadets sentenced to 9 years

Axel Giovany Casseus, 21, of Lauderdale Lakes, Fla, has been sentenced to nine years in prison for selling fentanyl-laced cocaine to spring breakers, including at least one Army football player, in Wilton Manors, Fla.

As spring breakers partied on South Florida beaches Thursday, the Lauderhill man who sold fentanyl-laced cocaine to a group of student vacationers last year appeared in federal court to learn that he will spend the next nine years in a federal prison.

Axel “Gee” Casseus, 22, pleaded guilty in December to selling the drugs almost exactly a year ago to the students who rented a home in Wilton Manors for their vacation. Six students overdosed, and two of them went into cardiac arrest after ingesting the dangerously potent, potentially lethal drug.

Judge Beth Bloom accepted the prosecutor and defense’s agreement and sentenced Casseus to nine years in prison followed by three years of supervised release.

The group included four cadets at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, including an Army football player, an Army spokesperson previously told the South Florida Sun Sentinel.

Casseus met two of the spring breakers on the beach in Fort Lauderdale on March 9, one day before the overdoses, and told them he sold cocaine, a criminal complaint said. His number was saved in one of the spring breakers’ phones as “Gee fort Lauderdale plug.”

The deal went through about 4:30 p.m. March 10, 2022. The students laid out seven lines of cocaine, the complaint said, and within minutes, police were called to the vacation home.

Casseus was arrested after an undercover set up and later admitted to selling to the undercover officer, according to the complaint.