UPDATE: Man who sold deadly drugs to Grand Forks woman to spend 25 years in federal prison

U.S. District Judge Karen Schreier sentenced Anthony John Tozer, 33, on Tuesday in Fargo to 300 months in confinement after pleading guilty to a controlled substance crime that resulted in the death of Faith Burns, a 20-year-old woman who died Dec. 17, 2017, after ingesting heroin that was laced with fentanyl, according to court documents.

The U.S. Attorney’s Office also has connected Ashlea Elizabeth Lajimodiere, 22, and Justin Howard Metcalf, 24, to Burns’ death. Federal court documents charging them with controlled substance crimes allege they were part of a conspiracy to possess and distribute a fentanyl mixture.

Federal court documents give few details on the the death of Burns or the conspiracy allegations, but a criminal complaint filed in December 2017 in Grand Forks District Court laid out how Burns traveled with an acquaintance to the Fairfield Inn in Grand Forks to pick up what she thought was heroin. She used the drugs in an apartment at 901 University Ave., overdosed and died, the complaint said.

Witnesses told police Tozer was “going to do a quick deal” with Burns in the hotel parking lot, a complaint said. He then panicked after he heard Burns overdosed from “the stuff he sold her,” another witness said in court documents.

Tozer faced a Class B felony of delivering fentanyl after the Grand Forks County State’s Attorney’s Office pursued charges, but the case was dropped last year after local prosecutors learned the U.S. Attorney’s Office in North Dakota would file its own criminal case.

Schreier could have given Tozer life in prison, but he signed a plea agreement that called for a lesser sentence.

The defendant has “expressed great remorse” for Burns’ death, his attorney, Lynn Slaathaug Moen of Mayville, N.D., said in a memorandum to the court. The criminal case was the result of his struggle with drug addiction, and Tozer needs treatment, Moen wrote.

“Anthony knows that he was wrong in this case,” the memo said. “He knows that his involvement with negative people and his addictions have ultimately led him to this situation.”

Tozer has faced multiple criminal cases in North Dakota that included drug charges.

Federal sentencing guidelines called for a minimum prison term of 20 years.

Metcalf, who is serving a three-year prison term for delivery and/or manufacturing meth in Grand Forks County, is scheduled to go to federal trial Feb. 26.

A sentencing hearing is set for Lajimodiere the same day. The maximum sentence for them would be life in prison, with a minimum of 20 years.