A Glynn County resident sentenced to 20 years in federal prison as part of Operation Ghost Busted pled guilty to trafficking the drugs responsible for two overdose fatalities.
32-year-old Jon Dillon Screen of Brunswick, Georgia, pled guilty to trafficking drugs, including the fentanyl that killed Screen’s girlfriend and a man from Brunswick.
In a press release on Thursday, Jill E. Steinberg, U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Georgia, said, “Dillon Screen’s sentence is among the highest of all defendants sentenced in Operation Ghost Busted, and for good reason: He sold drugs that killed people.” Steinberg added, “This multi-agency investigation and prosecution demonstrates our commitment to holding accountable those who illegally sell fentanyl and other deadly drugs.”
Operation Ghost Busted has charged more than 70 defendants for involvement in a complex drug trafficking scheme in Glynn County and its surrounding areas.
According to the press release, for over two years, investigators “collaborated with multiple federal, state and local agencies to identify the sprawling drug trafficking network. The conspiracy operated inside and outside Georgia prisons, coordinated by members of the Ghost Face Gangsters working with affiliates of other criminal street gangs including the Aryan Brotherhood, Bloods, and Gangster Disciples” the group in which Screen, who had a wide-ranging history of criminal activity, was a member.
Senior Supervisory Special Agent Will Clark of FBI Atlanta’s Brunswick office said, “Dillon Screen didn’t care whose lives he put in danger to sell his fatal drug mixtures, including his own girlfriend.” He added, “Operation Ghost Busted put a major dent in drug trafficking in Southeast Georgia. We will continue operations like this as long as gangs and dealers continue selling their deadly drugs.”
The problem of gangs is not new to Georgia, but law enforcement officials continue to fight back. In a press release on Wednesday, Attorney General Chris Carr announced that his Gang Prosecution Unit obtained an indictment in an Athens-Clarke County murder case by two alleged members of the Red Tape Gang. Carr said, “With our Gang Prosecution Unit, we’re fighting to combat violent crime in Athens and throughout our state.”
Attorney General Carr celebrated the indictment in an additional Facebook post on Wednesday. “Our Gang Prosecution Unit has secured yet another indictment in Athens…[w]e will continue to work with ACCPD to keep Georgians safe and ensure that justice is served,” he said.
In a Twitter (X) post on Wednesday, the Georgia Senate Republicans Georgia also spoke of their efforts to combat crime and keep communities safe, commenting that “Senate Republicans took a massive step toward creating safer communities and getting to the root of violent crime in our state. By expanding the Georgia Gang Prosecution Unit and Task Force, as well as increasing penalties for crimes such as setting cop cars on fire and selling and distributing substances such as fentanyl, we are committed to getting violent criminals off our streets.”
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Debra McClure is a reporter at The Georgia Star News and The Star News Network. Follow Debra on X / Twitter.
