Homicide suspected after man dies 6 weeks after another drug-related death at woman’s home
A Bellingham woman was arrested Tuesday, after a man she reportedly gave heroin to inject died at her home only six weeks after her former boyfriend died at her Sunnyland home in another suspected drug overdose.
The Bellingham Police Department booked Mia Ann Rawski, 33, into Whatcom County Jail on Tuesday, Nov. 2, on suspicion of controlled substance homicide.
Officers responded at 5:18 a.m. April 8 to Rawski’s home in the 2100 block of Franklin Street for a possible death investigation of a man, who was found unconscious and not breathing in the front yard, according to Whatcom County Superior Court documents. Resuscitation efforts by the Bellingham Fire Department were not successful on the 32-year-old man, and he was pronounced dead.
Rawski was the person who found the man unconscious and called 911, court documents state, and she told police that she and the man were friends and had spent the previous evening together at her house.
Rawski told police that she and the man had used heroin and that the man had injected heroin into his thigh, according to court records. Rawski reported that she fell asleep but later woke up and discovered the man unconscious in her front yard.
Rawski turned her “drug kit’ over to police at the time, documents state, and it was found to include several needles, a rubber jar with heroin residue, a clear plastic baggie with heroin residue and two vials of Narcan, which can be used to treat a narcotic overdose in an emergency.
Rawski also told investigators that she purchased the heroin that she and the man used, documents state.
Police had been called to the same home just six weeks earlier on Feb. 22 to investigate the death of a 37-year-old man who also died from an apparent drug overdose, court documents state, adding that the man was Rawski’s boyfriend at the time.
In that death, the Whatcom County Medical Examiner ruled that the man’s cause of death was “respiratory failure secondary to heroin and methamphetamine usage,” documents show.
Following that death, Rawski told police that she and her former boyfriend had used heroin before he lost consciousness and eventually died at her home, according to documents.
April death investigation
During an interview with investigators following the death of the 32-year-old man in April, court documents state that Rawski reported:
▪ She had gotten the heroin before the man arrived at her house on April 7 and that she and the man were the only two people at her house that evening.
▪ During the evening, she and the man drank alcohol, and she told him that she had heroin.
▪ She gave a portion of the heroin to him, and he smoked it in front of her.
▪ Rawski then injected a portion of the heroin into herself, which was her preferred method to take the drug, and the man showed interest in trying to ingest heroin in that way.
▪ Rawski handed the man a needle loaded with heroin and the man injected it in his thigh.
▪ She fell asleep shortly afterward, but awoke at approximately 5 a.m. and could not find the man in the house.
The Whatcom County Medical examiner ruled the man’s cause of death to be “Opiate and Ethanol intoxication,” according to court documents.
“These related investigations revealed that Rawski keeps Narcan on hand in her drug kit and also witnessed the death of her former boyfriend, just six weeks earlier, after he used heroin,” court documents state. “Therefore, it would be reasonable to conclude that she knows the potentially fatal risk of ingesting heroin.
“Despite that risk, Rawski obtained and provided (the man) with two different amounts of heroin on or around April 8, 2021, which was determined by the medical examiner to have caused his death.”
A warrant was issued for Rawski’s arrest on Oct. 7, court records show.
The Bellingham Herald has asked the Bellingham Police Department for details about Rawski’s arrest on Tuesday and if police are recommending charges in the death of Rawski’s former boyfriend.
This story was originally published November 3, 2021 at 7:46 AM.
