Autopsy: Inmate smuggled drugs in her body

The inmate who died in the Sheboygan County Detention Center last October refused to take medication for high blood pressure while incarcerated and had smuggled drugs inside her private parts, according to a report compiled by the Sheboygan Police Department.

However, neither staff nor inmates reported any signs of sickness prior to her death, based on the reports.

Samantha Sanchez, 25, was found dead in her cell on the morning of Oct. 25 due to "polysubstance toxicity," which indicates Sanchez had multiple drugs in her system at the time of her death. An autopsy conducted after Sanchez's death found 77 Diphenydramine pills, chewing tobacco; plastic baggies; and cotton fuzz found secreted inside her vagina.

According to the report, Sanchez had high levels of Diphenhydramine in her system, an antihistamine and sleep aid that goes by the brand name Sleepy Time, and levels of Xanax, both drugs that suppress the central nervous system.

She had turned herself in to Sheboygan Police Oct. 20 knowing she would be incarcerated after admitting to her probation agent that she had been using heroin, which was in violation of her probation.

The police report sheds light on a woman who struggled with addiction and who was hospitalized in the months before her incarceration with a multitude of serious medical conditions related to her heart, liver and kidneys.

The autopsy also noted that Sanchez's heart arteries had narrowed 40 percent and that the left ventricle of the heart was thickened.

Sanchez's family has a history of heart disease. She had been hospitalized for several weeks in August in a Milwaukee intensive care unit, where she went into cardiac arrest. Sanchez had prescriptions for medications related to high blood pressure and heart failure, but Department of Corrections nurses said Sanchez had refused to take the medication while incarcerated.

Sanchez had also given birth months prior to her incarceration. Information in the police report is conflicted on whether she used heroin during the pregnancy, but Sanchez's boyfriend said she started using heroin daily after being released from the hospital as a way to fall asleep at night.

The baby was delivered in August approximately two months early via C-section due to preeclampsia, a pregnancy complication characterized by high blood pressure.

In the days leading to her death, other inmates in her pod said Sanchez looked sickly and would stay alone in her cell, only coming out to eat lunch and dinner. Inmates told investigators that they believed Sanchez was high on heroin when she came into the jail, and they suspected she had smuggled heroin into the jail because she did not exhibit signs of "dope sickness."

Inmates said that Sanchez believed she lost a plastic zip-lock baggie suspected to contain heroin somewhere in the pod, although the inmates searched the pod and no one reported finding it. Sanchez was jailed in an all-female section of the prison, which had 12 other inmates in neighboring cells.

Jail staff last reported interaction with Sanchez during a 11 p.m. head count Oct. 24. She was discovered dead in her cell during the head count the following morning just after 7 a.m. Staff said they performed safety rounds every hour, but noticed nothing out of the ordinary during the night.

The inmate in the cell next to Sanchez told investigators that she believed she heard Sanchez throwing up in her cell around midnight the night of her death.

Police have finished their investigation and found no foul play in the death. No charges are being brought by Sheboygan District Attorney Joe DeCecco.

"Unfortunately, inmate Sanchez brought drugs into the detention center in her vagina and, presumably, ingested them in an amount that was the primary cause of her death," DeCecco wrote in the report. "While inmates in her pod stated she looked to be 'high,' these statements were not given until after Sanchez's death. No inmate reports or concerns were related to correctional staff until after Sanchez's death."

Reach Phillip Bock at 920-453-5121 or pbock@sheboyganpress.com. He can also be found at @Bockling on Twitter.