With the County’s safe parking program for the homeless on Oklahoma Avenue set to expire soon, the Sheriff’s Office arrested one of its inhabitants and charged her with murder, in what’s believed to be the County’s first case of an accused drug dealer being charged with murder after a customer overdosed.
The case started Oct. 27, 2022 when the Sheriff’s Department was dispatched to the now-closed County Animal Shelter on Oklahoma Avenue for a report of a dead man laying behind the building.
The County’s homeless safe parking lot is adjacent to the old animal shelter building, which was replaced last year with a new facility located a few hundred yards further down Oklahoma Avenue.
“The victim was identified as 31-year-old Quinn Hall of Templeton,” Sheriff’s spokesman Tony Cipolla said in a news release. “It was later determined that Hall died of a fentanyl overdose.”
An investigation quickly led to a suspect that they didn’t have to go far to find.
“During the investigation,” Cipolla said, “detectives discovered that shortly before Hall died, he was allegedly sold fentanyl by a woman identified as 50-year-old Brandi Turner, who was a resident of Oklahoma Avenue Safe Parking. Detectives determined the fentanyl that Turner allegedly sold to Hall led to his death.”
Deputies on May 15 arrested Turner and charged her with suspicion of homicide and assorted drug charges. According to Cipolla, “It is believed this is the first case in the county where a fentanyl death will be prosecuted as a homicide.” The investigation is ongoing and Cipolla asked anyone with information on the case to call Sheriff’s detectives at 805-781-4500.
