A London officer was cleared in the death of a man who died from a hidden fentanyl dose in a Tillsonburg cell, despite multiple searches.

A London police officer has been cleared by Ontario’s Special Investigations Unit (SIU) in the death of a 39-year-old man who overdosed on fentanyl in a Tillsonburg police cell in December 2024. The man, who admitted to using fentanyl, was searched four times using frisk and pat-down methods, one of which found drugs in his clothing, but the fatal dose was hidden in his buttocks—undetectable by standard searches. A strip search might have revealed it, but was not deemed warranted under Supreme Court guidelines requiring reasonable and probable cause. The man was held overnight, briefly moved for a bail hearing, and died after consuming the concealed drugs. The SIU found no criminal wrongdoing by the officer.