Autopsies show drug overdoses in two jail deaths

Drug overdoses killed two inmates who had been housed in the Mecklenburg and Union county jails recently, autopsy reports show.

Jamarcus McIlwaine died in the Mecklenburg County Jail of fentanyl overdose, according to an autopsy recently released by the N.C. Medical Examiner’s Office.

He was 34 when he died on June 28, about 21 hours after he was booked into the jail, according to records.

The autopsy of Dustin Kemp Medlin, 29, showed he died a month later from a lethal combination of heroin and methamphetamine. He had been booked into the Union County jail at 1:45 a.m. July 29 and was rushed to a hospital in Monroe several hours later, the autopsy said, after detention officers found him “combative, hallucinating and sweating profusely” in a holding cell.

He died at the hospital just after 7 a.m., according to a death report the jail filed with the state Department of Health and Human Services, which oversees supervision and safety rules for jails.

The DHHS investigated both deaths, and found no supervision deficiencies, DHHS correspondence shows.

McIlwaine is one of five people to die in Mecklenburg County Jail custody this year, a marked increase from recent years.

After the fifth death, in early October, Sheriff Irwin Carmichael asked the State Bureau of Investigation to start an independent examination into the deaths. That investigation is ongoing, SBI spokeswoman Patty McQuillan said this week.

McIlwaine’s autopsy provided more information about the circumstances surrounding his death.

During intake at the jail, early in the morning on June 28, he showed signs of withdrawal and was sent to the medical ward, according to his autopsy and a state inmate death report.

He was later transferred to a cell, and he was found unresponsive around 9:45 p.m., about half an hour after the last time he’d been checked, according to records.

He had a “fresh” injection site on his arm, the autopsy said. But Mecklenburg County Sheriff’s Office spokeswoman Anjanette Grube said the autopsy does not mean that he injected drugs while in the jail. She said autopsies often include signs of resuscitation efforts and, in the case of an inmate who’s recently entered the jail, could show signs of injections made before incarceration.

No contraband was found in McIlwaine’s possession or in his cell, Grube said.

“We cannot state that Mr. McIlwaine’s health condition would ever be deemed to be ‘healthy’ when he was brought to the jail or at any time during his stay,” Grube wrote in an email. “He had an extensive history of self-admitted frequent, ongoing, significant drug abuse, including use of many extremely dangerous and illegal drugs.”

The autopsy report for Medlin said he “developed altered mental status” during his booking at the Union County jail for methamphetamine possession. Tony Underwood, a spokesman for the sheriff, said one of the arresting officers told jail staff Medlin was suspected of hiding drugs in his rectum.

Medlin was strip searched. Nothing was found, Underwood said, but Medlin was put on a more intensive four-times-an-hour watch and confined to a single cell. State regulations require inmates suspected of being drug-impaired or intoxicated to be on a heightened watch.

“It was over the next two or three hours that they started realizing that his situation was getting worse, so the jail nurse came in and assessed him and they realized this guy needs outside medical help,” Underwood said.

The SBI is also reviewing Medlin’s death. That report will be given to the district attorney, Underwood said. Those reports are not public records, but can be released by the district attorney.

Another Union County jail inmate, Joseph G. Miles, 50, died July 21, but five weeks after he had been sent to a state prison hospital for care, Underwood said.

This story was originally published November 16, 2018 at 3:31 PM.