The death of a Newport man while incarcerated at the St. Albans prison has been ruled accidental from a drug overdose, according to Vermont State Police.
Shawn Gardner, 37, died July 26 at the Northwest State Correctional Facility. At the time, state police reported they were investigating what role an “unknown substance” played in his death.
In a press release Monday, state police said the final autopsy report, with completed toxicology testing from the state Chief Medical Examiner’s Office, revealed that Gardner’s cause of death was “acute mixed drug intoxication involving fentanyl, xylazine and cocaine.” The manner of death was ruled an accident due to the “use/ingestion of illicit substances,” the release stated.
So far this year, nine people have died while incarcerated in Vermont. According to authorities, foul play is suspected in only one of those cases — an incarcerated person who was allegedly beaten by another man in custody late last year and died earlier this year.
State police had reported shortly after Gardner’s death in July that he “became unresponsive in the shower area” at the St. Albans prison, and an initial investigation and examination of the scene found that Gardner was “in possession of an unknown substance” before becoming unresponsive.
Gardner was sentenced in 2018 to 32 months in prison for conspiracy to distribute heroin. The prison sentence was to be followed by three years of supervised release, according to court records, and he had been detained in July for allegedly violating the terms of that supervised release.
