Ryan Michael Reavis, one of the three drug dealers charged in the fentanyl overdose that killed rapper Mac Miller, has been sentenced to nearly 11 years in prison (via Rolling Stone). U.S. District Judge Otis D. Wright II announced the sentencing on April 18. Mac Miller, who was born Malcolm James McCormick, died in September 2018 at 26 years old. The Los Angeles County Medical Examiner and Coroner ruled a lethal combination of fentanyl, cocaine and alcohol as the cause of the rapper’s death.
Reavis reportedly asked for only five years in custody before he was sentenced, adding in a statement, “This is not just a regular drug case. Somebody died, and a family is never going to get their son back. My family would be wrecked if it was me. They’d never be all right, never truly get over it. I think about that all the time. And I know that whatever happens today, I’m the lucky one because my family is here and I’m here and I’ll be with them again. I feel terrible. This is not who I am.”
A sentencing memo from Reavis’ defense team noted that Reavis is “a heroin and opioid addict who delivered drugs to support his own addiction. He was not a supplier or an importer, nor was he connected to any larger criminal conspiracy.”
According to Rolling Stone, prosecutors in the case read a statement from Karen Meyers, Millers mom, before the sentencing was announced.
“My life went dark the moment Malcolm left his world. Malcolm was my person, more than a son. We had a bond and kinship that was deep and special and irreplaceable. We spoke nearly every day about everything – his life, plans, music, dreams,” the statement said. “He would never knowingly take a pill with fentanyl, ever. He wanted to live and was excited about the future. The hole in my heart will always be there.”
Meyers remembered her late son’s laugh as “infectious and bright” and said his music “spoke to many people all over the world.”
Stephen Andrew Walter admitted last October to supplying Reavis with the fentanyl that killed Miller. Walter accepted a plea deal carrying a 17-year prison sentence. A case against Cameron James Pettit, the third drug dealer charged in Miller’s overdose, is still pending.
