One arrested on unrelated charge after string of drug overdoses in Austin, police say

The ongoing criminal investigation into a spate of possible overdose-related deaths in Austin this week has not pointed to a "single organized group" distributing narcotics, a police spokesperson said Thursday, though at least one arrest has been made on an unrelated charge.

Austin police believe the uptick in overdoses was the result of people ingesting crack cocaine potentially laced with fentanyl, a highly addictive painkiller used legally in medical settings, said Anna Sabana, the police spokesperson. Two milligrams of fentanyl — the equivalent of 10 to 15 grains of table salt — can be deadly for the user, according to the Drug Enforcement Administration.

Nine Travis County residents have died this week in what authorities have described as the worst "outbreak" of opioid overdoses the Austin area has seen in at least a decade. Since Monday, Austin-Travis County Emergency Medical Services responded to 79 overdose calls in Travis County, Capt. Christa Stedman said Friday. Austin-Travis County EMS typically responds to two to four opioid overdose calls per day, she said.

Preliminary toxicology reports by the Travis County medical examiner's office show fentanyl was present in all nine deaths, said Hector Nieto, a county spokesperson. Cocaine was also present in eight cases and methamphetamine in three. The definitive causes of the deaths will be subject to toxicology testing by the medical examiner's office. The testing might take 30 to 60 days to return final results.

As part of their investigation, police have seized approximately 3 grams of crack cocaine that tested positive for fentanyl and cocaine and made two arrests, Sabana said. The police are "conducting proactive undercover operations" in various parts of Austin in an attempt to find and arrest narcotics dealers and obtain more information on the source of the fentanyl.

Police will provide an update Monday on the number of arrests and narcotics seized after the weekend, Sabana said. Police on Friday did not provide additional information in response to an American-Statesman inquiry about the investigation, including whether charges were forthcoming against two people detained Monday.

As of Thursday, neither of the people detained on Monday faced charges relating to the alleged distribution of narcotics or the string of possible overdose-related deaths. One of the two detained was not booked into the Travis County Jail, according to jail spokesperson Kristen Dark, while the other was arrested on a charge unrelated to this week's overdoses.

Using surveillance cameras positioned in downtown Austin, police observed a woman and a man "engaged in multiple hand-to-hand transactions" of "suspected narcotics." In an arrest warrant affidavit for the man obtained by the Statesman, an officer in the department's narcotics unit said the duo had a history of "narcotics activity" and were known by officers as narcotics dealers.

The two were "the possible suspects that dealt narcotics to one or more of the subjects that overdosed," the officer wrote in the arrest warrant affidavit.

Police later arrested the man, Johnny Lee Wright, 55, on suspicion of unlawful possession of a firearm by a felon, according to the affidavit. Wright, who was convicted of possession of a controlled substance last summer and barred from possessing firearms as a result, had a small black bag with a loaded .380-caliber handgun inside, the officer wrote in the affidavit.

The Statesman is not naming the woman detained by police because she has not been charged. In an unattributed statement Friday, a police spokesperson said her involvement was "still being investigated." The affidavit penned by the officer did not state whether police discovered narcotics on their persons upon detaining the two people.

In addition to Wright, police arrested someone as part of the investigation on suspicion of possession of a controlled substance, a third-degree felony, Sabana said. In the unattributed statement Friday, police declined to disclose the name of the person, saying, "At this time, due to investigative reasons, we are not releasing the name."

Reports of possible overdoses have slowed since the initial wave of 911 calls on Monday.

This week, Austin-Travis EMS distributed more than 400 doses of Narcan, a medication that can reverse the effects of opioid overdoses. Of the 79 overdose calls since Monday, bystanders administered Narcan in 31 of the cases prior to first responders arriving, Stedman said.

Statesman staff writer Serena Lin contributed to this report.

This article originally appeared on Austin American-Statesman: One arrested on unrelated charge after string of drug overdoses in Austin, police say