Drug dealer asks for forgiveness before sentencing today for death of customer

YOUNGSTOWN

Roderick Means asked for forgiveness just before he was sentenced in Mahoning County Common Pleas Court to five years in prison for providing the drugs a woman used that resulted in her death.

As he was escorted out of the courtroom of Judge Lou D’Apolito on Tuesday by sheriff’s deputies, the victim’s sister looked at him and said, “I forgive you.”

Means, 33, pleaded guilty Feb. 2 to a charge of involuntary manslaughter for the death of Melanie Anderson, 41, in April 2016 after she took a dose of what she thought she was heroin, It was actually fentanyl, a high-risk, synthetic opioid painkiller many times more powerful than heroin and morphine.

Anderson’s sister, Sherry, tearfully told the judge her sister helped her get through and later cope with a rough childhood and she feels lost without her.

“I have the weight of the world on my shoulders,” she said. “I feel terrified and frozen inside.”

The dose Anderson brought was 100 percent fentanyl. Read more about the case in Wednesday's Vindicator or on Vindy.com.