JOE COSCARELLITom PettyNew York: Tom Petty, the chart-topping singer and songwriter, died in October from an accidental drug overdose as a result of mixing medications that included opioids, the medical examiner-coroner for the county of Los Angeles announced on Friday, ending the mystery surrounding his sudden death last year. The coroner, Jonathan Lucas, said that Petty's system showed traces of the drugs fentanyl, oxycodone, temazepam, alprazolam, citalopram, acetyl fentanyl and despropionyl fentanyl. But Petty's official death certificate, released about a week later, listed his cause of death as "deferred" pending an autopsy. "Many people who overdose begin with a legitimate injury or simply do not understand the potency and deadly nature of these medications." In 2016, the pop singer Prince was found to have died from an accidental overdose of self-administered fentanyl, a synthetic opiate estimated to be more than 50 times more powerful than heroin.

Source: The Telegraph January 20, 2018 20:26 UTC