Aaron Hernandez’s body had traces of synthetic marijuana in it when the former New England Patriots tight end committed suicide last week, according to a report from Newsweek’s Michele McPhee.
An autopsy conducted after Hernandez’s death revealed a positive test for the drug K2, “two law enforcement sources with direct knowledge of the case” told McPhee earlier this week.
According to those sources, the positive test prompted a raid at the Souza-Baranowski Correctional Center, where Hernandez was serving a life sentence for the murder of Odin Lloyd.
From McPhee:
Dozens of Massachusetts State Police troopers assigned to the State Police Emergency Response Team and Tactical Operations Team searched the SBCC — the jail where Hernandez died last week — looking for contraband, including paper soaked with the synthetic marijuana known as K2, the sources told Newsweek. …
Department of Correction sources say it is unusual for state troopers to conduct an SBCC prison search, and that the presence of DOC Internal Affairs officials and the department’s Commissioner Thomas Turco indicates a wide-scale investigation is underway at the prison, where one correction officer has already been “detached with pay” after being accused of missing around at 2 a.m. Hernandez was found dead at 3:03 a.m. There was also a “shakedown of the warehouse” shared by SBCC and a second prison, MCI-Shirley, the sources said. Both inmates and DOC employees work in that warehouse, which is used to store dry goods before they go into the prison, DOC sources confirm.
Hernandez was laid to rest Monday in his hometown of Bristol, Conn.
Thumbnail photo via Keith Bedford/The Boston Globe via USA TODAY Sports Images
