Joshua Hakeem

BUTLER TWP — A Butler man is accused of selling fentanyl-laced heroin to another man who overdosed and died last fall at a Route 8 south hotel.

Butler Township police Monday charged Joshua A. Hakeem, 30, with providing the drugs that ended in the death of 29-year-old John Kolakowski of Butler.

Hakeem, who is already in Butler County Prison in violation of his probation in an unrelated case, was to be arraigned this morning.

He is charged with a top count of drug delivery resulting in death, a first-degree felony that carries a maximum sentence of 40 years in prison.

Additionally, he is charged with felony and misdemeanor drug possession, and involuntary manslaughter and reckless endangerment, both misdemeanors.

Authorities said Kolakowski was found dead shortly before 1 p.m. Oct. 19, 2015, in a room at the Days Inn after hotel staff went to check on him when he did not show up for his scheduled checkout.

Police were called and found empty stamp bags of suspected heroin and a syringe in the room. There were no injuries or other trauma on the body to suggest foul play.

Butler County Deputy Coroner Larry Barr pronounced Kolakowski dead at the scene. He said that rigor mortis had set in, and the victim had been dead for about 12 hours.

Kolakowski, who apparently had no permanent address, had checked into the hotel Oct. 18, investigators said.

An autopsy later determined Kolakowski died of combined heroin and fentanyl toxicity, said Butler Township police Chief John Hays.

The National Institute on Drug Abuse describes fentanyl as a powerful synthetic opioid analgesic that is similar to morphine but 50 to 100 times more potent.

Fentanyl is a schedule II prescription drug and is typically used to treat patients with severe pain, to manage pain after surgery, or for chronic pain.

It did not take long, Hays said, for investigators to identify Hakeem as a suspect. He was interviewed within several days after Kolakowski’s death.

Hays would not say what the defendant told police during that interview and one subsequent interview. But he characterized the suspect as “cooperative.”

According to the investigation, police allege Hakeem sold Kolakowski heroin, apparently tainted with fentanyl, two times at the hotel and at least one other time at another location in the township.

An exhaustive review of surveillance video at the hotel showed the defendant going to the victim’; s room — purportedly to sell heroin — on two different occasions within days of Kolakowski’s death.

The labor-intensive investigation, Hays explained, was a primary reason it took so long to file charges. Police also had to wait for the results of autopsy and toxicology tests and review their findings with the district attorney’s office.

Hakeem has been in the county prison since July 28, according to prison officials, when he was arrested on at least one bench warrant and for a probation violation.

Butler County Court records showed he was convicted in June 2015 of theft and two counts of receiving property in a pair of separate cases.

He was sentenced to 10 to 20 months in prison followed by 20 months’ probation.