Seattle, WA. — The first defendant sentenced in a sweeping federal drug trafficking case targeting Seattle’s homeless encampments and International District received a 30-month prison term Wednesday in U.S. District Court, federal officials announced.
Theodore Nation, 36, was sentenced by U.S. District Judge Tana Lin after pleading guilty to his role in a large-scale drug trafficking organization. Nation has been in federal custody since January 2025. During sentencing, Judge Lin said Nation had been dealing drugs “to particularly vulnerable and marginalized members of the community.”
“This drug trafficking organization sold addictive substances to some of the most marginalized members of our community — those living in homeless encampments such as ‘The Jungle’ under Interstate 5,” said First Assistant U.S. Attorney Charles Neil Floyd. “This defendant made his living feeding the addiction of others, making it ever more difficult for them to escape the dangers of homelessness.”
According to prosecutors, Nation acted as a redistributor within the organization, which sold fentanyl, methamphetamine, cocaine, and heroin in homeless encampments and drug trafficking areas of the International District, including near 12th Avenue and Jackson Street.
The investigation began in November 2023 and was led by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Drug Enforcement Administration, and the Seattle Police Department. Investigators used court-authorized wiretaps to gather evidence and monitor threats of violence while avoiding detection by suspects.
In the initial round of arrests and indictments in January 2025, law enforcement seized 17 firearms and 23 kilograms of suspected fentanyl powder. A second enforcement phase in late May 2025 resulted in additional arrests and major drug seizures. In March 2025 alone, authorities confiscated approximately 100 pounds of methamphetamine, 111 kilograms of cocaine, 19 kilograms of fentanyl powder, 250,000 fentanyl pills, and four kilograms of heroin, with an estimated street value of nearly $3 million.
DEA Seattle Special Agent in Charge Robert A. Saccone said the fentanyl powder seized during the investigation alone represented more than 1.7 million potentially lethal doses. “Mr. Nation trafficked fentanyl and other deadly drugs in and around our homeless encampments and preyed on the most vulnerable in our community,” Saccone said.
FBI Seattle Special Agent in Charge W. Mike Herrington said the organization fueled a deadly cycle of addiction and violence. “This organization and others like it drive the fentanyl crisis in the United States with drugs that all too often prove fatal,” Herrington said.
In court filings, prosecutors cited data from the King County Medical Examiner’s Office showing fentanyl-involved overdose deaths in King County rose from 167 in 2020 to 1,086 in 2023, before declining to 788 in 2024 and 696 in 2025.
The investigation also received support from the Internal Revenue Service–Criminal Investigation, the King County Sheriff’s Office, and the Tukwila Police Department. Federal prosecutors said additional defendants charged in the case are expected to be sentenced in the coming months.
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*** NOT ONLY IS THIS A DIS- SERVICE 2 ADDICTIVE & HOMELESS POPULATIONS.. BUT IT HAS CREATED THE LAWS THAT PREVENT HONORABLE HUMANS WHO DESPERATELY NEED MEDICAL TREATMENT FROM RECEIVING PROPER CARE * DRUG TRAFFICKERS NEED 2 B PERMANENTLY RELOCATED 2 THE MIDDLE OF A (NO) SERVICES DESERT SO THAT THEY CAN VISIT WITH THEIR CREATOR ***