DEA hosts family summit in Baton Rouge on the overdose epidemic

BATON ROUGE, La. (WAFB) - The Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) hosted a summit in Baton Rouge amid growing concerns surrounding fentanyl.

108,000 people died to a drug overdose in 2021, according to DEA Special Agent in Charge Brad Byerly. To put that into perspective, that’s more people than what Tiger Stadium can hold.

Byerly said two major Mexican cartels are the ones to blame.

“They are importing this into the United States, and they’re supplying the local drug traffickers with these drugs, and its what’s causing these drug poisonings,” Byerly said.

The summit featured families who have lost loved ones to drug poisonings or overdoses, federal partners, and community prevention groups.

One of the people in attendance was Angele Mixon.

“If we can save one family from suffering through all of this, that’s worth all of us,” Mixon said.

In February 2021, her daughter Kailyn Elizabeth Kaough died from fentanyl poisoning. She was only 26.

In the middle of our interview, we noticed a tattoo with the words “Still I Rise” on her right arm, and her daughter’s name on her left. She says that quote by the late Maya Angelou was her daughter’s favorite.

“It means everything. Her memory is why I get up every day. I still have two daughters to raise. So, I do it for them. I don’t have the luxury of falling apart. So, instead of doing that, we get up and we fight. We don’t care what people think, and they can look down on us if they want, but that’s not what it’s about. It’s about saving lives,” Mixon said.

Mixon and the dozens of other families that were there are working to prevent others from experiencing the tragic loss of a loved one that they have experienced.

Leaders say these local summits will provide opportunities to share information, build connections, and foster collaboration between family groups, DEA, and other key sectors of their local community.

“I made a mistake, I became addicted, but I was able to live and get treatment. Now and days, one mistake, you can’t rehabilitate a dead person and that’s what’s happening,” Lilly Harvey, an advocate in drug recovery said.

Harvey is in recovery and lost a daughter similar to Mixon.

The two advocates say education is the key to curbing this problem. They say they will continue to teach people about the dangers of fentanyl, and hopefully save lives.

“If we can save one family from suffering through all of this, that’s worth all of us,” Mixon said.

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