Abilene man charged in teen fentanyl overdose death, police say counterfeit pills sold

Abilene police added a first-degree felony murder charge to Tristan Blake McCrary’s case after investigators tied counterfeit fentanyl pills to the December 2023 death of 16-year-old Jerrin Hernandez.

Police said Hernandez was found dead in a bedroom at a South Abilene home by family members, and the death first appeared to be an overdose. The murder count was added while McCrary was already being held in Taylor County Jail on unrelated charges, and bond was set at $1 million.

The charge marks a sharp turn from a routine overdose investigation to a homicide case built around alleged drug distribution. Police said the Abilene Narcotics Unit has now filed five fentanyl-related homicide cases since May 2024, a pace that reflects how aggressively local investigators are treating deadly pill cases when they believe a seller’s conduct led directly to a death.

Court documents reported by KTXS say police allege McCrary sold fake fentanyl pills to Hernandez after the two were introduced by a friend. Hernandez’s mother told investigators she last saw her son in the kitchen the night before she found him dead in his bedroom the next morning. Police said evidence collected at the scene included illicit counterfeit fentanyl pills and signs of prior drug use by Hernandez.

The case falls under a broader Texas shift that took effect after House Bill 6 became law on September 1, 2023. The measure expanded murder liability for certain fentanyl deaths, giving prosecutors a path to pursue homicide charges when they believe a person manufactured or delivered fentanyl that caused a fatal overdose. Abilene’s latest filing shows how that law is now being used on the ground, with narcotics agents building cases that treat fatal counterfeit-pill sales as more than drug possession or delivery.

State health officials also track the crisis through a fentanyl dashboard that follows fentanyl poisoning-related deaths across Texas from 2014 through December 31, 2025, underscoring the scale of the drug’s toll. In Abilene, though, the focus is now on one bedroom, one teenager, and one charge that turns an overdose death into a felony murder prosecution.