Pasco toilet clogged with 3+ lbs of fentanyl pills leads to prison term
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- Officers recovered more than three pounds of fentanyl pills from a Pasco toilet.
- Defendant in case accused of plan to kill attorneys.
- He had already served a sentence for attempted 2nd-degree murder.
Clinton Paul Patterson has been sentenced to 20 years in prison after officers arrived to arrest him at his girlfriend’s Pasco house and found partially dissolved fentanyl pills he had attempted to flush down the toilet.
The mass of blue and green pills fished out of the toilet contained more than three pounds of fentanyl.
Patterson was part of a sophisticated fentanyl trafficking operation that distributed tens of thousands of pills across Washington state, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for Eastern Washington.
The drug distribution network operated between Seattle and Spokane with meetings frequently arranged in Ritzville north of Pasco, according to the prosecution.
An investigation started in December 2023 when 5,475 fentanyl pills, some cocaine, guns and multiple cell phones were seized in a Spokane area home.
A defendant in that case said Patterson, 42, was his main source of drugs, supplying 5,000 to 20,000 fentanyl pills a week.
Text messages and other records showed that Patterson directed drug distribution activities, coordinated meeting locations and arranged payments of thousands of dollars, according to the prosecution.
When Patterson was arrested in Pasco in October 2024, law enforcement also found cocaine and MDMA in the house and nearly seven grams of fentanyl pills in his car, according to the prosecution.
Patterson had traveled to Pasco despite being on probation in Seattle following a 2-year and 6-month prison sentence for conspiracy to distribute 40 grams or more of a mixture containing fentanyl in 2020.
He committed that crime shortly after he was released from prison after a 20-year sentence for attempted second-degree murder for shooting a victim in the face during a dispute over a marijuana purchase when he was 17. He also had five separate cocaine convictions as a minor, according to court documents.
In the case involving drugs seized in Pasco, Patterson was accused by another inmate of planning to kill his attorney by breaking their neck in court and then use the distraction to kill the prosecutor in the case, according to court documents.
The defense said in a court document that it was not a real threat and was being given too much credence by the prosecution.
The sentence by U.S. Judge Thomas Rice included 10 years probation after serving the 20-year prison sentence for distribution of 400 grams or more of fentanyl.
“This sentence was well deserved in this case given the huge quantity of deadly fentanyl involved and Patterson’s pattern of violent and drug-related criminal conduct,” said Pete Serrano, first assistant U.S. Attorney for the Eastern Washington District, after the sentencing.