A Change of Plea Hearing has been set for Robert Lang, the Warren man caught by a Drug Enforcement Agency sting back in October 2022.

The hearing will take place March 12, 2024 at 8:30 A.M. before Judge Donald C. Nugent.

The Final Pretrial Conference was February 22, 2024.

The DEA used a GPS tracking device and invisible dye to trace a package back to Lang. The package was originally being sent to a home on Clearwater Street NW in Warren. According to an affidavit filed in the U.S. District court, a Homeland Security special agent was informed by FedEx Corporate Security that this package was opened.

The contents included toys, kinetic sand, bags of peanuts and a shrink-wrapped kilogram brick wrapped in a towel. The brick was tested at the DEA Youngstown Resident Office and a presence of hexanoyl fentanyl hydrochloride, a synthetic opioid, was revealed.

Investigators resealed the package with fake drugs, and sent it to the original delivery address. A sensor was also put on the package that would alert officials when the package was opened, as well as invisible dye.

Lang arrived to the Clearwater Street NW address and picked up the package from a woman police saw inside the home. After getting the package Lang delivered it to a a home one Stephens Avenue NW. 

Lang was detained, and an ultra violet light revealed the fluorescent green dye that had been sprayed inside the package.

Lang told investigators that he didn't know what was in the package, and was told only the tracking number and that the package had been delivered by the shipper.