Two Mexican Nationals Sentenced to Decades in Prison for Fentanyl and Heroin Distribution in Myrtle Beach

FLORENCE, S.C. — Federico Parra Lopez, 32, and Marcos Flores Aquino, 25, were sentenced to 30 years and 24 years in federal prison, respectively, for conspiring to distribute kilogram quantities of fentanyl and heroin in the Myrtle Beach area, the U.S. Department of Justice announced on June 3, 2026.

The two men, both Mexican nationals who were in the United States illegally, were convicted alongside co-defendants Miguel Angulo Perez, 22, and Omar Sanchez Aquino, 33, who received sentences in the same case at earlier dates. All four participated in a conspiracy that moved fentanyl and heroin into the Myrtle Beach region of South Carolina.

The sentences impose immediate incarceration in the federal Bureau of Prisons system with no parole. Under federal trafficking statutes, the convictions carry mandatory minimum terms that the court applied after jury verdicts or guilty pleas. The operational result is the permanent removal of the four defendants from street-level distribution networks in the Southeast.

Downstream, the Department of Homeland Security must now execute final removal orders once the criminal sentences conclude. Immigration and Customs Enforcement will take custody of the men at the end of their prison terms for deportation proceedings to Mexico.

The case also supplies federal prosecutors in the District of South Carolina with precedent for charging similar cross-border trafficking organizations under 21 U.S.C. conspiracy provisions.

This sentencing concludes a multi-defendant prosecution that began with the arrests and indictments of the four Mexican nationals. It forms part of the Justice Department’s ongoing effort to prosecute fentanyl distribution networks operating inside the United States, as documented in repeated U.S. Attorney’s Office releases from the District of South Carolina.

The Myrtle Beach convictions add to the public record of foreign nationals convicted of fentanyl trafficking in federal court. Per the June 3 Justice Department release, the four men were the only defendants in the conspiracy.