Crime Fix with Angenette Levy - 3 New Details in Death of Doctor at Firefighter Boyfriend's Home

Episode Date: March 7, 2024

Dr. Sarah Sweeney was found dead at the home of her boyfriend, firefighter Robert Daus, outside of St. Louis in January. Sweeney is the second significant other of Daus' to die at his home since 2020. The death of his former fiancee, Grace Holland, was determined to be a suicide but her family has questioned that finding. This week, Frontenac Police said an autopsy revealed how Dr. Sweeney died. Law&Crime's Angenette Levy talks with retired medical examiner Dr. Mary Jumbelic about the results in this episode of Crime Fix — a daily show that delves into the biggest stories in crime.Host: Angenette Levy  https://twitter.com/Angenette5Guest: Dr. Mary Jumbelic https://twitter.com/maryjumbelicCRIME FIX PRODUCTION:Head of Social Media, YouTube - Bobby SzokeSocial Media Management - Vanessa BeinVideo Editing - Daniel CamachoAudio Editing - Brad MaybeGuest Booking - Alyssa Fisher & Diane KayeSTAY UP-TO-DATE WITH THE LAW&CRIME NETWORK:Watch Law&Crime Network on YouTubeTV: https://bit.ly/3td2e3yWhere To Watch Law&Crime Network: https://bit.ly/3akxLK5Sign Up For Law&Crime's Daily Newsletter: https://bit.ly/LawandCrimeNewsletterRead Fascinating Articles From Law&Crime Network: https://bit.ly/3td2IqoLAW&CRIME NETWORK SOCIAL MEDIA:Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lawandcrime/Twitter: https://twitter.com/LawCrimeNetworkFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/lawandcrimeTwitch: https://www.twitch.tv/lawandcrimenetworkTikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@LawandCrimeSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Wondery Plus subscribers can binge all episodes of this Law and Crimes series ad-free right now. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify. New details about the death of a young doctor after her firefighter boyfriend found her dead in his home outside of St. Louis. The case sparking speculation because it's the second time in a number of years a significant other of the firefighter was found dead in his home. Thanks for joining me for Crime Fix. I'm Anjanette Levy. Dr. Sarah Sweeney was found dead in the home that she shared with her boyfriend, firefighter Robert Dawes, back on January 13th. Dr. Sweeney was young. She was only 39, and her death at such a young age raised some concerns because of an unfortunate coincidence.

Dawes' former fiance, Grace Holland, died in 2020 at his home. Police determined Holland died as the result of a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head, but her family has named Dawes in a wrongful death lawsuit. This week, Frontenac police released the cause of death for Dr. Sweeney. They said the St. Louis County Medical Examiner determined that Dr. Sweeney died from a drug overdose. The lethal combination was the opiate pain medication oxycodone, gabapentin, and diphenhydramine, which is better known as Benadryl. But Dr. Sweeney's manner of death remains undetermined. Police say they also determined that Sweeney was at home alone in the time leading up to her death and that Dawes actually called 911 after finding her dead.

The investigation is ongoing, but reading between the lines, it doesn't look like suspicion is falling on Robert Dawes. I also found out that Dr. Sweeney was undergoing treatment for pain at the time of her death. Dr. Sweeney had lifelong medical challenges, including two hip replacements, because she was diagnosed with Perthes disease as a child. She also suffered from mast cell activation syndrome. More on that in a moment. Joining me to discuss the autopsy results for Dr. Sweeney is another doctor. She's Dr. Mary Jumbalek.

She's a retired medical examiner for Onondaga County in Central New York. Dr. Jumbalek, thanks for coming on. Your first thoughts about the autopsy results here, the finding that Dr. Sweeney died of multiple drug intoxication. Well, I think in every case that's investigated by the medical examiner's office, there's a consideration of what caused the death,

you know, a disease process, a drug intoxication in this case. And then there's a consideration of the manner of death. How did it come about? Was it an accident or was it a natural death or was it a homicide or a suicide? So both of those factors are considered when you're looking at the results from an autopsy.

And that's just the basics of death investigation. For this particular case, because the toxicology came back as an overdose, there's a lot of things that go into consideration for that. Was the medication prescribed to the decedent? Were they using it recreationally? Was there a pill count done on remaining pills that might be available in the house? How was it administered, oral or IV? And then what did the blood and the tissue level show at autopsy? Because in a chronic user, a level could be seemingly high, but for someone naive to the drug, it might kill them.

So all of those things have to be taken into consideration by the medical examiner when they make the determination of overdose, as they did in this case. And let's break this down a little bit. I have learned that she was, Dr. Sweeney was prescribed oxycodone. That's an opiate used to treat pain. So that was part of the overdose here gabapentin which can be used to treat seizures was also part of it along with diphenhydramine which is an over-the-counter medication we would call it benadryl that's the brand name so that would be used to treat a condition that she had it was called mass activation

syndrome so she had been treated for pain she was undergoing what was called palliative care meaning she was being treated for pain and she had a lot going on health-wise she had dealt with some issues with her hips ever since she was a child. She had been diagnosed with what was called Perthes syndrome and had hip replacements. So I'm asking you to speculate a little bit here, but could the oxycodone have been as possibly being used to be treated for any type of pain related to that or the other mast cell syndrome that she had? Well, what I've seen in the news reported, she had oxycodone, gabapentin, and diphenhydramine. You mentioned her two disease processes, Perthes and mast cell activation syndrome, and she's receiving palliative care. So the meds she's receiving are meant to make her comfortable. They're not curative of her disease processes.

We see this sometimes with very, very serious illnesses, serious heart disease, serious brain injuries, all of that. So it was serious enough for her to be receiving this palliative care. And both the oxycodone and the gabapentin could have been used for a pain syndrome that she might've had because gabapentin can be added for neurologic pain that might, sometimes it helps people. So again, I don't know what she was prescribed or the doses or how she took it, if she took it on a regular basis or took it when she thought she needed it. And all of that would need to be evaluated in order to determine how much was in her system when she died. And I did reach out to the St. Louis County Medical Examiner's Office to try to get some more information, some more reporting about this or to get the reports. And my call as of the time of this recording has not yet been returned, but we're trying to get some more information about the exact levels.

What's interesting here, Dr. Jumbalik, is the fact that we have a cause of death here, but we don't have a definitive manner of death. What we have right now is an undetermined manner of death. And there's been a lot of speculation surrounding Dr. Sweeney's death because of the circumstances that I mentioned earlier on in the show. But what's interesting about this is the fact that they're still investigating it. I spoke with the police department yesterday. There's there's still under investigation. It's not closed, but there's still some additional testing going on on some other items. And there are five manners of death. That's homicide, natural, accidental, suicide, and undetermined. So right

now we're in undetermined. Is it possible with additional testing of things at the scene or things like that, that we could get a manner of death to go along with the cause of death? Or is it possible her manner of death just remains undetermined? Well, yes, I think you can get to a manner of death with more testing as they are doing. I think rarely, as medical examiners, we're left to determine undetermined, and it's not a category we like. We like to try to exhaust all investigative possibilities to see if we can narrow it down. But we still have to do that within a reasonable degree of medical certainty.

So we can't just put it down because it sort of seems like it. It's a sophisticated determination. So that being said, overdoses are very difficult to evaluate when someone might use a drug recreationally, when someone is on chronic medication. And you have to really look at the levels in the blood, in the tissue, the stomach contents, the scene where pill bottles were there, how full were they, were they empty? Was she taking the medication appropriately? Anything like that. So looking at that level and what it is in her and Dr. Sweeney is going to be important to determine whether she accidentally took too much of her medicine, whether she intentionally took too much of her medicine, or whether there's something more nefarious going on. I've learned some new information about this as well. It sounds like, you know, there's been a lot of reporting out there and speculation about Dr. Sweeney's boyfriend, the firefighter in this case, because his former fiance had died by suicide. At least that was the

ruling a few years prior. And so people have wondered, oh, my goodness, what is going on? Did this guy do something? It doesn't sound like to me, and I'm just kind of reading between the lines here, that law enforcement believes that that occurred. They have not said that to me, but it's my understanding. The firefighter did call 911 when he found her, that he has been cooperative with the investigation. So it doesn't sound like to me that there is a lot of suspicion surrounding him. So do you think that, wow, this guy could just be incredibly unlucky? I mean, can you imagine you're dating two separate women and this happens? I mean, I can't even imagine. Yeah, I know very little about the prior case, but I will say just in general that when a manner of death is determined and you look at it years later, perhaps with new information in light, you know, the medical examiner can, you know, re-evaluate the case. It doesn't mean something was missed originally. It just means new information came to light

and the case is reviewed and you can amend the death certificate if it needs to be, or you can affirm it if you agree with your original findings. So that is typical in all situations with the death certification. You know, the fact that there's a possibility that two women committed suicide and they also happen to be linked to an associate, you know, a friend. Well, I don't know. You know, it does feel like a very unfortunate situation, but they each have to be evaluated on their own merit with the scene, with the autopsy, with the toxicology results and if it involves interviewing and questioning friends and family. Yeah. It'll be interesting to see how this all pans out. But right now, it sounds like they are saying, the Frontenac Police Department is saying that all of the evidence

that they have found is that Dr. Sarah Sweeney was home in the time leading up to her passing. The firefighter, firefighter Dawes, found her and called 911. He's been cooperative from the very beginning. And it's just really sad and unfortunate for anybody to pass away from any type of overdose. Really sad situation, though. It sounds like this is just a woman who had a lot going on in her life and had a lot of struggles, medically speaking, given the fact that she had the Perthes syndrome, which resulted in the hip replacements and then the other condition. It's just that's a lot medically to deal with. Yes. And I've run into that situation in other cases. And it's always helpful to do what we call a psychological autopsy, if you will, which you're informally mentioning now, but where you look very carefully at the week, the month prior to the person's death, and you interview people that she was in contact with, not just looking at text messages, but more in depth.

So you can get a feeling for the emotional state of the person, you know, prior to their death. And for me in the past, that's been very helpful in differentiating accident versus suicide. You know, what was the intent of the person when they lay down in bed. Well, hopefully we'll learn more in the weeks and months to come. Just a very sad situation. Dr. Mary Jambalek, thank you so much for coming on. We appreciate your time and your expertise. You're welcome. Thank you so much. And that's it for this episode of Crime Fix. I'm Anjanette Levy. Thanks so much for being with us. We'll see you back here next time. Until then, have a great night. You can download Crime Fix on Apple, Spotify, Google, and wherever else you get your favorite podcasts and new episodes post each

weeknight at 6 Eastern time on Law and Crime's YouTube channel. Daniel Camacho does our video editing. Our head of social media is Bobby Zoki. Our senior director of social media is Vanessa Vine. Savannah Williamson is one of our producers. Diane Kay and Alyssa Fisher book our guests. And Brad Mabey is our audio editor.