That’s the sentence a Federal District Court in Manhattan handed down to 37-year-old Grei Mendez, operator of the Divino Niño day care, which was actually just a front for an illegal fentanyl processing and selling operation.
In September 2023, little Nicholas Feliz Dominici was playing at the day care center with his friends when all four of them suddenly became sick. The other three survived their exposure to fentanyl after being treated with Narcan, an emergency medicine that counteracts an opioid overdose.
Little Nicholas received Narcan, but didn’t survive.
“After tragedy struck, [Mendez] lied to law enforcement and destroyed evidence in an effort to protect herself.”
Before immediately calling 911, Mendez first took the time to call her husband, Felix Herrera Garcia, who rushed to the scene and was filmed running off carrying heavy bags—presumably evidence of the murderous drug lab the pair were running.
The judge in the case, Jed S. Rakoff, said the perpetrator’s actions showed they cared about protecting themselves “above the opportunity to save a life.”
Like the coward he is, Herrera Garcia ran away to Mexico, where he was arrested on a bus and extradited to the US. He also received a 45-year sentence.
Imagine that unsuspecting mothers sent their kids off every day to be supervised and cared for by a pack of monstrous drug dealers masquerading as human beings. It boggles the mind.
Grei Mendez swore she knew nothing about the fentanyl and was completely blameless. She insisted she would not have children around narcotics because “I know that stuff kills.”
Then, she deleted over 20,000 emails, including messages where she and her husband discussed their drug business.
Eventually, Mendez gave up her masquerade of innocence and pleaded guilty.
When police raided the day care center, they found 11 kilograms of fentanyl and heroin hidden beneath the floorboards, directly under play mats children slept on. They also found kilo presses for processing fentanyl.
Little Nicholas’ father, Otoniel Feliz, said it was “horrible that drugs were found in a place where children are cared for. In what mind does it make sense that you’re going to mix narcotics with children?”
These people used the same kitchen tools to prepare the children’s lunch that they used for processing their fentanyl for profit, causing prosecutors to speculate that this was how the children ingested the drug.
No sentence could ever be enough.
“Nicholas won’t come back with 45 years.”
“After tragedy struck, [Mendez] lied to law enforcement and destroyed evidence in an effort to protect herself and her co-conspirators,” prosecutors said.
Incredibly, Mendez said: “Believe me, this has left me traumatized. Please have some pity toward me.”
Nicholas’ grief-stricken mother, Zoila Dominici, was short on pity.
She told Mendez in court: “Forty-five years is not enough. It is not possible to forgive something like this. I do not forgive you. Let God forgive you.”
“A beautiful little boy lost his life,” District Attorney Darcel Clark said. “Our sorrow is matched only by outrage because these babies were shields to protect a narcotics operation. Nicholas’ death was entirely—excruciatingly—needless and avoidable.”
“Parents entrusted Grei Mendez with the care of their children,” said US Attorney for the Southern District of New York Damian Williams. “She and her co-conspirators put them directly in harm’s way, running a narcotics operation and storing deadly fentanyl out of the very space in which the children ate, slept and played. The disregard shown by Mendez and her co-conspirators for the lives of the children under her care is simply staggering.”
The scourge of fentanyl, 50 times stronger than heroin, still lashes America, with over 74,000 deaths from fentanyl and other synthetic opioids in 2023. While most such fatalities are addicts who choose their own path and take their own risks, little Nicholas had no choice.
It was the boy’s first week at the day care.
“Nicholas won’t come back with 45 years, nor with [Mendez’s] excuses for us to forgive her,” said Dominici.
How much punishment would be enough? Torture? A death sentence? No. We must be more merciful—more human—than those who killed little Nicholas.
“No punishment can make up for a child lost,” said Acting US Attorney Matthew Podolsky.
The sad truth is that we may just have to settle for these drug-peddling monsters knowing in their hearts that they ripped the life from an innocent child, robbed his family of his love and cheated that little boy of his happy future.
May Nicholas’ death serve as a rallying point for a war to end the sale of fentanyl, before any more innocent children die.
