Court docs: Exposure to fentanyl, xylazine led to Mount Airy baby's death, father's arrest

A Mount Airy 1-year-old who died in February was exposed to a fatal mixture of fentanyl and xylazine, according to court documents.

While other children in the county have died from exposure to fentanyl, Hamilton County Coroner Lakshmi Sammarco said she believes this is the first child to die from exposure to this drug combination.

Kymari Walker was found unresponsive on Feb. 12 in a home on West North Bend Road, police said. Paramedics pronounced him dead at the scene.

Last week, 21-year-old Kymani Walker, Kymari's father, was arrested and charged with involuntary manslaughter.

According to court documents, the elder Walker had fentanyl and xylazine in an area of an apartment where his son could access the mixture, "become exposed and subsequently die."

Sammarco said drug combinations with fentanyl account for most of the overdose deaths in the county at this time.

Xylazine, often called tranq, is especially dangerous because it is not an opioid. Therefore, Narcan will not reverse an overdose from it.

Used as a tranquilizer for livestock, xylazine is cheap and allows drug dealers to use less of the more costly fentanyl. Its use exploded around 2020 with Philadelphia becoming a hotbed for the drug.

There were 86 fatal overdoses in Hamilton County involving xylazine between January and September of 2023, the coroner's office reported.

Sammarco warned that these combinations of drugs put users at a higher risk of overdose.

"When you buy drugs off the street, you have no idea specifically what compounds are in the drug at what concentrations," she said. "Without knowing any of that, it's hard to gauge the danger."

Kymani Walker is being held on a $500,000 bond at the Hamilton County Justice Center. A Hamilton County grand jury is expected to review his case by April 15.

This article originally appeared on Cincinnati Enquirer: Cincinnati father arrested after baby dies to fentanyl exposure