A woman accused of supplying fentanyl to a man days before he died of an overdose in Napavine in January 2023 was arrested on drug charges on Wednesday.
“This was an ongoing, year-long investigation regarding the death of an individual due to an overdose involving fentanyl,” the Napavine Police Department stated in a news release. “Our agency received the assistance of members from the Lewis County Sheriff’s Office
and the Joint Narcotics Enforcement Team during this investigation.”
The investigation began on Jan. 22, 2023, when Napavine police were dispatched to a restaurant in the 100 block of Birch Avenue Southwest for a report of a van that had been in the parking lot for several days.
A responding officer “approached the van and observed there was a male occupying the van who did not appear to be in good health,” according to charging documents filed in Lewis County Superior Court on Thursday.
The officer soon confirmed the man was dead.
His body was “positioned close by two circular plastic containers, which contained methamphetamine and a small blue pill” suspected to be fentanyl, according to court documents.
An autopsy later confirmed the man, a 34-year-old Rochester resident, died of “acute fentanyl intoxication and methamphetamine abuse,” according to court documents.
The victim’s phone was sent to the Washington State Patrol’s tech crimes unit for data extraction. A Napavine officer later reviewed the messages on the victim’s phone, which included several texts between the victim and Jillian Lee Connors, 37, of Rochester, between Jan. 15 and Jan. 19, 2023.
The texts reportedly documented the victim’s purchase of four fentanyl pills from Connors.
When contacted by a Napavine officer and Joint Narcotics Enforcement Team detectives at her Rochester residence on Wednesday, Connors allegedly admitted to supplying the victim with fentanyl four days before his death, according to court documents.
A search of her residence yielded two suspected fentanyl pills and suspected meth.
Connors was booked into the Lewis County Jail just before 8 p.m. on Feb. 28, according to court documents.
While she was initially booked for controlled substance homicide, the Lewis County Prosecutor’s Office did not file that charge.
“The state has not been able to link that to a death,” Deputy Prosecutor Brad Meagher said of the allegations during a preliminary hearing on Thursday.
Instead, Connors was charged Thursday in Lewis County Superior Court with one count of delivery of a controlled substance and two counts of possession of a controlled substance.
Bail is set at $20,000. Arraignment is scheduled for Thursday, March 7.
