DALLAS
The last of four defendants charged in the 2014 heroin overdose death of a Dallas teen plead guilty Tuesday in federal court, according to officials.
A 37-year-old heroin dealer is the latest, and last, defendant to appear in federal court and plead guilty to a felony drug offense stemming from his role in the March 2014 heroin overdose death of 19-year-old Rian Hannah Lashley, officials said.
Jimison Erik Coleman, 37, of Los Angeles, California, admitted his role in the death of Rian Hannah Lashley. He plead guilty to one count of conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute heroin, officials said.
Coleman is the last of four defendants charged in the case to plead guilty.
The other three defendants charged in the case, Kathryn Grace Dirks, a/k/a “Kat,” 25; Glen William Brunton, 28; and Cierra Allyn Rounds, 27; also pleaded guilty to that offense.
Each defendant faces up to 20 years in federal prison. Sentencing hearing have been set for the upcoming months.
New York Daily News reported that Rounds, a Dallas stripper, and her friends spiked a naive teen with a knockout dose of heroin as part of a twisted robbery plot.
The 27-year-old exotic dancer claimed in federal court that they wanted only to “incapacitate” the first-time user, but the injection of “China White” proved fatal, federal prosecutors said.
Cierra Rounds confessed her role in the scheme during her guilty plea, the Daily News reported.
Rounds said she and three others met 19-year-old Rian Lashley on March 25, 2014 at an IHOP restaurant to sell her $100 worth of heroin, the Daily News reported.
The Daily News reported that prosecutors said the defendants knew Lashley was carrying about $3,000 in cash along with a phone and iPad.
“The injection was too much for Lashley. She began to struggle, and Rounds and Dirks dumped her in a bathtub of ice water in hopes of counteracting the heroin, prosecutors said,” according to the Daily News. “They later put her on a couch. Lashley passed out and never woke up.”
These are the facts and circumstances surround this case, according to the FBI press release:
- Coleman admitted that from December 2013 until April 2015, he routinely distributed heroin and other drugs to multiple customers, some of whom worked as dancers in various strip bars in the Dallas area as well as clubs in Southern California.
- From time to time, Coleman fronted quantities of drugs to particular dancers who then, at his direction, sold the drugs to patrons and/or dancers with whom they came in contact.
- During this time, officials said Coleman distributed multiple grams of heroin, multiple hits of ecstasy and molly, multiple ounces of cocaine and various prescription drugs to numerous customers in North Texas and elsewhere.
- During the early morning hours of March 25, 2014, Coleman and Dirks traveled from a residence in Plano, Texas, to a nearby IHOP restaurant, where they joined Rounds, Brunton, and Rian Lashley, and the group ate breakfast.
- Coleman admits that he had provided Dirks, Rounds and Brunton with heroin on numerous occasions before to that date.
- Late that morning in a parking lot near the IHOP, Coleman gave Brunton five baggies totaling one gram of “China White” heroin and directed him to deliver the heroin to Lashley, who was with Dirks and Rounds in Lashley’s vehicle.
- Brunton, at Coleman’s direction, sold the heroin to Rian Lashley for $120.00.
- After getting the heroin, Rounds, Dirks and Lashley left the parking lot in Lashley’s vehicle and went to a residence in Dallas where Rounds was living.
- Coleman and Brunton left the parking lot in a separate vehicle.
- On March 25, 2014, Rian Lashley died at a residence after being injected with the heroin that she purchased from Coleman earlier in the day.
- Coleman was not present when Lashley was injected with the heroin that, according to the autopsy, resulted in her death.