Robert De Niro’s Daughter Drena Says ‘the Internet’ Played a Role in Her Son Leandro’s Overdose Death at 19

Drena De Niro is speaking candidly about what she believes contributed to the tragic death of her only son, 19-year-old Leandro De Niro Rodriguez.

Leandro was found dead in New York City on July 2, 2023, after an accidental drug overdose. In a new interview published Saturday, Nov. 29, the 58-year-old daughter of Robert De Niro told Page Six that her son’s online behavior, the prevalence of fentanyl and the isolation of the COVID-19 pandemic all played a part.

Before he started using harder substances, Drena said Leandro “liked to smoke weed, he liked to party and have a good time,” but things escalated quickly in a way that deeply worried her. “He got messed up so fast that I knew something wasn’t right here, and I knew it had something to do with what he was doing on the internet,” she told the outlet.

“There was a change in him that was so fast,” she recalled, adding that she did not want to go into specifics about his online activity, though she did mention TikTok.

In the time leading up to his death, Leandro had been “talking about” going back to rehab, Drena said. It would have been his second attempt at treatment after a previous, negative experience in a rehabilitation facility.

“That was very sad to me because he wanted help,” she said. “He knew he was over his head. I don’t think he even knew why. I think he had been exposed to much harder drugs that he didn’t know about.”

Days after Leandro’s death, Drena — who shared her son with former partner Carlos “Mare” Rodriguez — wrote on Instagram that “someone sold him fentanyl laced pills that they knew were laced yet still sold them to him.”

Nearly two years later, in October, five people were arrested in connection with the case. In 2023, the New York City Chief Medical Examiner determined that Leandro died from the toxic effects of fentanyl, bromazolam, alprazolam, 7-aminoclonazepam, ketamine and cocaine.

Speaking to Page Six, Drena described the arrests as “really strange” and “so bittersweet because you don’t feel any happier.”

“I’m hoping they do get some justice. If you’re going to sell drugs to young people, it doesn’t matter whether you made it, whether you know or didn’t know, you’re taking a chance,” she said. At the same time, she added, “I’m not interested in ruining some 24-year-old’s life.”

Drena also reflected on her son’s life, his bond with his grandfather Robert, 82, and the day she learned that Leandro was gone. “This detective stood there,” she remembered of the moment she received the news, “and the whole world as I knew it collapsed.”

Describing Leandro, she told Page Six, “He was just an amazing kid, he was so smart.”

“We were extremely close,” she continued. “Really it was the first time in my life that I got to have an identity that had nothing to do with my father, or ‘I’m the this’ of someone else — all of a sudden, you have this relationship in your life with someone who knows the best of you, the worst of you.”

Her father, she added, “got to have the … experience of just being a grandfather with him,” and Leandro was “just this pure soul.”

This year, Drena and Robert launched the Leandro De Niro Rodriguez Foundation, which aims to expand “access to care for young people & families impacted by the fentanyl crisis,” according to the organization’s social media page.

Drena said that creating the foundation was, in part, a way to “help prevent other families from ever having to know this pain.”

“It was really painful and shocking and violating for his story to go so viral, to hear people’s horrible thoughts,” she said. “But a part of me was like, ‘He’s not going to be some horrible sound bite. I’m going to make sure you know who this kid is and you’re going to know about all these other parents who are losing their kids.’ ”