Murder charges filed after San Mateo woman dies from fentanyl overdose
(KRON) — An alleged drug dealer is facing murder charges after a 29-year-old woman, Sarah Tillman, overdosed on fentanyl and died in her San Mateo apartment, according to prosecutors.
Phillip Thei Ng, 56, of Daly City, is accused of selling fentanyl to Tillman that caused her deadly overdose, the San Mateo County District Attorney’s Office said. Ng made his first court appearance on Wednesday and he did not enter a plea.
San Mateo Police Department officers found Tillman dead at home on May 6, 2023 while officers conducted a welfare check. The DA’s Office wrote, “Prior to her death, victim had struggled with various forms of addiction (and) alcoholism while seeking admission to medical school.”
Tillman graduated from Harvard University with a bachelor’s degree in neurobiology, court records show. She earned a master’s degree in medical science at the University of Southern California in 2021, her LinkedIn page states.
Tillman worked as a communications manager for Nobias Therapeutics, a pharmaceutical company based in Silicon Valley, her page states.
In early 2023, she met Ng and began buying drugs from him, prosecutors said. In March of 2023, Tillman was revived with Narcan, a life saving opioid-reversing treatment, from a near-fatal overdose. “Afterward, victim warned defendant he had nearly killed her with the drugs he sold her,” prosecutors wrote.
While probing Tillman’s death, investigators said they found text messages indicating that Ng sold her drugs, again, just before she died. Prosecutors charged Ng with first-degree murder.
Ng will return to the San Mateo County Hall of Justice on May 22 for arraignment. He bailed out of jail on a $50,000 bail bond and he remains out of custody.
Cluster of fentanyl overdose deaths reported in Marin County
Ng is also facing a civil case filed against him. Tillman’s parents, who live in Marin County, filed a wrongful death lawsuit in February.
The lawsuit states that Tillman died from a mixture of fentanyl and bromazepam with amphetamine. Her family believes that the victim did not intend to use fentanyl and bromazepam. The young woman’s life was “tragically cut short due to drugs supplied by Phillip Ng … causing an accidental overdose,” attorneys wrote in the lawsuit.
The civil lawsuit demands a jury trial.
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