A 22 year old man from Yankton has been sentenced to 22 years in Federal Prison for selling fentanyl resulting in the death of a young woman. The U-S Attorney’s Office reported Evan Nelson was also sentenced to four years of supervised release and ordered to pay $8,860.66 in restitution to the victim’s family.
On December 22, 2023, Nelson sold several fentanyl pills to the 15-year-old female victim from Vermillion. She took one of the pills and suffered a fatal overdose from fentanyl toxicity. The next morning, her mother found her deceased in her bedroom in the family home. Text messages on the victim’s phone showed she arranged to purchase the pills from Nelson at a gas station near Gayville.
Investigators later learned Nelson had purchased the pills from co-defendant Udda Kobaba several days earlier in Sioux Falls. Kobaba was previously sentenced to 20 years in federal prison for his role in the case.
Nelson was sentenced January 26th and immediately sent to prison.