Heroin Supplier Found Guilty of Drug-Induced Homicide

A DuPage County judge found a Chicago man guilty of supplying heroin that caused another man’s death after a three-day bench trial last week in the Wheaton Courthouse, the DuPage County State’s Attorney’s Office announced.

Judge Blanche Hill Fawell reached her verdict Monday morning, finding Malcolm Brown, 25, guilty of one count of drug induced homicide.

Brown, of the 2700 block of West Lexington in Chicago, was accused of supplying heroin to an acquaintance of Stephen Briston, of Wheaton, on July 27, 2011. The next day, Briston died from what was later determined to be a heroin overdose.

An investigation led Carol Stream police to Brown, who was taken into custody the same day. Brown has been held at the DuPage County Jail since then on $5 million bail.

DuPage County State’s Attorney Robert B. Berlin that DuPage County experienced 46 heroin deaths last year along. Every day in the United States, more than 100 people die as a result over heroin overdose and more than 6,700 are treated in emergency rooms for misuse or abuse of drugs, according to the Center for Disease Control.

“These numbers are simply astounding,” Berlin said in a written statement. “People have got to realize that heroin is an incredibly dangerous drug that can kill an otherwise healthy person with just one use. Today’s verdict sends the message that in DuPage County we will aggressively pursue those who peddle this poison to our residents”

Berlin thanked Carol Stream police and assistant state’s attorneys Audrey Anderson and Deborah Brewer for their outstanding work “in holding Mr. Brown accountable for the death of Stephen Briston.”

Drug induced homicide is a Class X Felony punishable by up to six to thirty years in the Illinois Department of Corrections. Brown’s next court appearance is scheduled for April 21, for return of the pre-sentencing report.