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Omar Rodríguez Ortiz

Fri, April 22, 2022, 7:00 AM

A Florida couple will spend the rest of their lives in prison for killing a police informant and mother of three by using a syringe filled with fentanyl and methamphetamine.

A U.S. district judge in Ocala sentenced David Chappell Fey, 57, and Shari Lynn Gunter, 58, Wednesday to life imprisonment for murdering a 31-year-old woman in Central Florida.

In December, separate juries had found them guilty of murdering a government witness and distributing meth from their Summerfield home, among other charges, court records show.

The woman, identified in court documents as K.B., “had agreed to cooperate with law enforcement” by purchasing $40 worth of meth from Fey and Gunter in January of 2016, the U.S. Attorney’s Office said Thursday in a statement.

After discovering that K.B. was helping authorities, the couple made a “hot shot” — a syringe containing a lethal amount of fentanyl and meth — and gave it to her on April 5 of the same year, according to investigators.

When K.B. injected herself, authorities say she immediately collapsed and Gunter then dragged her outside, kicked her in the head and placed her in the passenger seat of her car. In the vehicle, Fey and Gunter injected her with a second, fatal dose of fentanyl and meth.

They then drove the victim to a cemetery in the nearby town of Oxford — staging the scene to make it appear like an accidental overdose, according to investigators.

The couple killed K.B. “to prevent her from acting as a witness against them,” according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office.

“The United States is currently in the midst of an unprecedented opioid epidemic,” said Deanne L. Reuter, Miami Field Division Special Agent in Charge of the Drug Enforcement Administration. “This sentencing highlights our commitment to our Florida communities, our efforts to bring justice to the victims and their families, and our resolution to hold these drug traffickers accountable for their actions.”