GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. (WOOD) — At only 10 months old, Chance Powell was the youngest victim of the opioid epidemic in Kent County in 2015, the deadliest year the county has seen yet.
Powell, who lived with his grandmother in Sparta, died of morphine toxicity in October, 2015, after accidentally ingesting a pill.
According to the police report, his grandmother told detectives that she kept her morphine bottle inside her bra because her adult kids have drug problems and she couldn’t trust them not to steal the pills.
“She also said that she puts a piece of wadded up tissue in the bottle to keep them from rattling around when she walked,” a detective for the Kent County Sheriff’s Department wrote in his report.
The baby’s death was among 109 fatal drug overdoses in 2015, up from 75 in 2014. Of those 109 overdoses, 84 were due to opioids, like heroin and prescription pain medication.
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