‘1 pill that’s all it took. Fentanyl kills,’ Arlington mother writes on billboard
Patricia Saldivar’s heart-breaking campaign for her 22-year-old daughter is a project that the Arlington mother never planned.
After all, just as the year started, Cassandra Saldivar was a single mother, raising her young son and enjoying life.
But just a month after she moved into an Arlington apartment with a roommate, Cassandra Saldivar took one Percocet laced with fentanyl, killing her on the morning of June 1, her mother said.
“I didn’t know it existed before this,” Patricia Saldivar said Wednesday in a telephone interview with the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, referring to fentanyl. “We’re still in shock.”
Patricia Saldivar was convinced that she and her family had to do something to curb the fentanyl use in Arlington.
So last week, she paid $2,100 for a billboard with a smiling picture of her 22-year-old daughter with this message: “1 pill that’s all it took. Fentanyl kills. R.I.P. 06/01/21. In memory of my beloved daughter Cassandra.”
The billboard went up at Bob Duncan Drive and Division Street in Arlington just south of AT&T Stadium, home of the Dallas Cowboys.
The billboard will stay up for four weeks during the busy football season in Arlington.
“I just wanted to get the word out about fentanyl,” Patricia Saldivar said.
And Patricia Saldivar and her family are not stopping at just the billboard.
In the next few days, she plans to deliver fliers with the same deadly message about fentanyl to school officials at Arlington Bowie High School, her daughter’s high school, and Arlington Sam Houston High School along with other nearby junior highs. She said school officials will then pass them out to students.
Her campaign comes just as officials with the Drug Enforcement Administration issued a public safety alert this week on the sharp increase in fake prescription pills containing fentanyl and methamphetamine.
DEA officials warned that international and domestic criminal drug networks were flooding the United States with lethal counterfeit pills.
More than 9.5 million counterfeit pills had been seized this year in the United States, according to DEA statistics. That total is more than the last two years’ combined. And DEA agents have seized fake pills in every state.
“The United States is facing an unprecedented crisis of overdose deaths fueled by illegally manufactured fentanyl and methamphetamine,” said Anne Milgram, administrator of the Drug Enforcement Administration, in a Monday news release. “Counterfeit pills that contain these dangerous and extremely addictive drugs are more lethal and more accessible than ever before.”
In the Arlington case, police were notified by paramedics in the early morning hours of June 1 that a 22-year-old woman had died en route to a local hospital of a possible overdose. That woman was later identified as Cassandra Saldivar.
Arlington police responded to the 2400 block of Henderson Drive, where a 911 call had originated. Friends of Saldivar said she had fallen asleep on a couch, but when they went to check on her she was cold to the touch and she had blood running from her nose.
Her friends told Arlington police she had taken several pain killers and consumed alcohol earlier in the day. They told Arlington police Cassandra Saldivar was known to use illegal drugs.
Patricia Saldivar said she wasn’t aware that her daughter had a drug problem.
“She had never been arrested and she wasn’t one of those people who had been going to drug rehabilitation for years,” Patricia Saldivar said. “I was young once, so I know things happened, but we had a good relationship.”
Officials with the Tarrant County Medical Examiner’s Office ruled that Cassandra Saldivar died from fentanyl and methamphetamine, and her death was ruled an accident.
“Officers did not find any evidence of foul play and the Medical Examiner’s Office ruled her death accidental — so from an investigative perspective, her case has been cleared,” according to a statement released by Arlington police on Thursday.
Just the day before Cassandra Saldivar passed away, 12-year-old Ellianna Martinez died from fentanyl toxicity in her Richland Hills home.
Earlier this year, Fort Worth police issued a warning about an increase in fentanyl overdose cases in the area, leading to an “alarming number” of deaths. The current numbers of deaths related to fentanyl in Fort Worth and Tarrant County were not available on Thursday.
Arlington police said they were aware of multiple cases reported where dealers have laced Percocet tablets with fentanyl. For that reason, Arlington police strongly encouraged that:
▪ The public only consume prescription medications that they themselves picked up from a pharmacy at the direction of a licensed health professional
▪ The public safely dispose of any unused or expired prescription medications. Arlington police will have their next Drug Take Back event on Oct. 23.
Patricia Saldivar said she just wanted to do something against the fentanyl problem.
“I hope there’s not as many deaths,” Patricia Salidivar said, referring to her fentanyl campaign. “I just hope to put a stop to it.”
This story was originally published September 30, 2021 at 1:56 PM.
