Camden County jail inmate admits providing drugs that caused fellow inmate's overdose death

 Autopsy found acute fentanyl intoxication

BRUNSWICK, GA:  An inmate at the Camden County Detention Facility has admitted providing the drugs resulting in another inmate’s death by overdose.

Joshua Swing, 36, of Woodbine, Ga., pled guilty in U.S. District Court to Distribution of Fentanyl, said David H. Estes, Acting U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Georgia. The charge carries a possible penalty of up to 20 years in prison, and there is no parole in the federal system.

“The law enforcement and medical community face an unprecedented fight against the epidemic of opioid abuse, and synthetic opioids like fentanyl add fuel to that raging inferno,” said Acting U.S. Attorney Estes. “The corrupting influence of illegal narcotics distribution makes it especially disturbing that this deadly poison was provided to a jail inmate by another inmate.”

The investigation began May 17, 2020, when an inmate at the Camden County Detention Facility, identified in court documents as J.D., was found unresponsive in his cell. J.D. later died, and a subsequent autopsy found that his cause of death was acute fentanyl toxicity. Swing admitted he provided the fentanyl J.D. consumed.

Swing previously was convicted in April 2018 in state court in Nassau County, Fla., for sale of methamphetamine. 

“I was honored that our agency was able to investigate this case and bring it to conclusion on behalf of the people of Camden County and Sheriff Jim Proctor, and perhaps bring a sense of closure for the people involved,” said Lowndes County Sheriff Ashley Paulk.

The case is being investigated by the Lowndes County Sheriff’s Office at the request of the Camden County Sheriff’s Office, and is being prosecuted for the United States by Assistant U.S. Attorneys Matthew Josephson and E. Greg Gilluly Jr.