SPOKANE — A federal judge sentenced a 37-year-old Spokane man to 20 years in prison followed by 10 years of supervised release for operating a commercial pill press that produced fentanyl-laced drugs from his home basement.
U.S. District Judge Thomas O. Rice imposed the sentence on Nicholas Adams on Friday for his role in the operation, which authorities said could have yielded more than 2 million potentially lethal fentanyl pills.
Adams and co-defendant Timothy Maddox obtained the pill press by mail from China and set it up in Adams’ residence in Spokane’s Hillyard neighborhood, according to court documents and details from the sentencing hearing. They mixed fentanyl powder with cutting agents to create pills for bulk distribution.
Search warrants executed in November 2023 at multiple locations recovered large quantities of fentanyl powder, cutting agents, pill press components and several firearms, including an operational commercial pill press. The Department of Ecology assisted due to hazardous contamination throughout Adams’ home…