By Bryan Horwath
Las Vegas Review-Journal
LAS VEGAS — A Las Vegas man was arrested Thursday on three felony charges, including second-degree murder, related to “supplying drugs to correctional institutions in Nevada and California,” according to a Friday news release.
The news release, from the Nevada Department of Corrections, said that Hoza Del Collins, 30, was charged with felony second-degree murder for supplying substances causing death, felony selling or transporting drugs, and felony related to “furnishing a controlled substance to a state prisoner.”
The arrest was made, the release said, as part of an “ongoing investigation into the source of illegal substances being introduced into correctional institutions in Nevada and California.”
According to an online jail roster, Collins was being held at the Clark County Detention Center without bail as of Friday afternoon. He has a court appearance scheduled for Tuesday.
After serving the warrant, the release said, investigators found “toxic substances believed to be used in the creation of synthetic drugs being supplied into Nevada and California prisons.”
Collins served time in the Nevada corrections system for burglary several years ago, according to the department.
The arrest comes after a series of homicides in Nevada’s prisons that are believed to be drug-related, the department said.
Nevada prison officials, the release said, are “battling the introduction of synthetic drugs, which are made up of common household items such as bug killers, harsh cleaning agents,” and other products.
Prison officials said “paper” can be “laced” with the substances and introduced to the prisons that way.
For the one-month period from July 16 through Aug. 17, five inmates, all under the age of 40, died at High Desert State Prison, with three of those deaths being investigated as suspected homicides, according to the department. The latest inmate death at High Desert was reported Friday by prison officials, though a cause of death was not given.
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