A Bronx drug dealer whose use of his wife’s daycare center as a secret stash house for fentanyl resulted in the death of a 22-month-old boy and nearly killed three other small children will serve 45 years in prison for the September 2023 incident that horrified the city, a Manhattan judge ruled Wednesday. The steep term was handed down to Felix Herrera Garcia more than a year after the death of Nicholas Feliz-Dominici at Divino Niño Daycare in Kingsbridge. Manhattan Federal Judge Jed Rakoff said Herrera Garcia’s actions had not only posed a “severe risk” to “the pitiful innocent babes that were poisoned and, in one case, killed,” but also people to whom he peddled the highly-potent drug the government says is a primary driver of overdose deaths across the U.S. Sam Costanza for New York Daily NewsPolice are seen at the Divino Nino Day Care located at 2707 Morris Ave. on Friday, September 15, 2023 (Sam Costanza for New York Daily News) Herrera Garcia, 35, dealt out of the daycare drug mill from at least October 2022 through the child’s death, according to court records. He pleaded guilty in June to possession with intent to distribute deadly narcotics, resulting in death and a related conspiracy charge. In court papers filed ahead of the sentencing, federal prosecutors described how Herrera Garcia and his alleged accomplices — his wife Grei Mendez, cousin Carlisto Acevedo Brito, Renny Parra Paredes, and Jean Carlo Amparo Herrera — put the children at grave risk by using the same kitchen utensils used to prepare food at the daycare as they did to package drugs. They knew that the drugs posed a severe risk to the kids or ignored it, the feds said, having themselves suffered “repeated bouts of vomiting from the drug exposure” while handling the dangerous substances. The disturbing incident occurred after Mendez fed the kids and put them down for a nap after morning activities. One was picked up by their mother, and the others stayed asleep. When Mendez checked on them hours later, they were unresponsive, and she called her husband and then 911, prosecutors wrote. Herrera Garcia arrived before the ambulances, running into the daycare through the front door and leaving two minutes later carrying two duffel bags full of narcotics. All the while, the kids lay unconscious on the floor.   Herrera Garcia is seen leaving the day care carrying two duffel bags full of narcotics. (Court Evidence) Medics at Montefiore Medical Center in Norwood “frantically” tried to save baby Nicholas. “The emergency room physician who treated (Nicholas) and then informed (Nicholas’s) parents of his death has described that experience as one of the worst of her life,” court documents describe. The other children — a 2-year-old who suffered severe bodily injury and a toddler and an 8-month-old who were poisoned — were saved after medics administered Narcan to them. Agents who searched the daycare center discovered a kilogram-sized brick of fentanyl and two press machines. Days later, beneath playmats and cribs where kids played, ate, and napped, two trap doors were discovered that hid more than 11 grams of fentanyl and heroin. Agents discovered trap doors that hid more than 11 grams of fentanyl and heroin. (Court Evidence) Herrera Garcia fled to a friend’s place in the Bronx and then embarked on a two-week trip across the U.S. to Mexico, where local authorities expelled him. He was arrested in California and then extradited to New York. Prosecutors had requested a life term, arguing in court papers that he’d caused “tremendous damage and pain,” trafficking the deadly drug “despite knowing that it had killed his own brother and believing it had sent his own young son to the hospital.” In an emotional statement to the court, translated through a Spanish interpreter, Herrera Garcia apologized to the victims and their families. “I have nightmares about what happened that day,” he said, claiming that he stayed at the scene until he heard sirens. “I was concerned for the children.” Herrera Garcia is the first person charged in the case to face justice. His wife and cousin have pleaded not guilty. Parra Paredes and Amparo Herrera have pleaded guilty to related charges and are awaiting sentencing. “This case demonstrates the deadly reach and scope of the fentanyl epidemic, and the tragic collateral damage it inflicts on American lives,” Manhattan U.S. Attorney Damian Williams said in a statement.