A Fayette County man suspected of selling drugs that led to an overdose death last month has been arrested and charged with murder, the sheriff’s office announced.
Levi McElwaney, 23, of Fayetteville, was taken into custody Friday, Fayette Sheriff Barry Babb said. McElwaney is also facing a charge of using a telecommunication facility for a drug transaction.
Deputies tracked down and arrested McElwaney a week after they responded to an overdose call, Babb said. On Jan. 26, deputies found a man dead on what investigators believe was the prescription painkiller Oxycontin.
Credit: Fayette County Sheriff's Office
Credit: Fayette County Sheriff's Office
Babb said they were able to identify McElwaney as the man suspected of selling the pills to the victim. Babb has prioritized the pursuit of drug dealers whose illegal products result in overdose deaths, he said.
“I believe this case meets all the elements of murder and we’re not backing down. I hope this case will encourage others to take the same route,” Babb said.
Other law enforcement agencies that have brought murder charges against suspected drug dealers have seen defendants fight lengthy legal battles. Dunwoody police have charged two suspects with murder in cases of overdose deaths, neither of which has gone to trial.
In the first case, from 2019, a 22-year-old man overdosed on heroin laced with fentanyl, police said. The case against the suspect, 32-year-old Antoin Thornton, remains pending in DeKalb County after he was re-indicted in 2021, court records show. He was released from the DeKalb jail on bond in March 2020 and has remained free since then.
The second case involved charges against 45-year-old Ivan Lightsey of Norcross, according to police. Lightsey was charged with murder in connection with the overdose death of a 34-year-old man at a Dunwoody home in August.
Investigators said they linked Lightsey to the overdose and took out warrants charging him with murder after finding him in the Gwinnett County Jail, where he remains after being arrested on a laundry list of unrelated drug charges. Lightsey’s case is still pending in Gwinnett and no murder case has been filed against him in DeKalb, court records show.
McElwaney was booked Friday into the Fayette jail, where he remains. Court records show that he was set to face trial on unrelated charges from last year after he was accused of driving while under the influence of drugs, among other counts. His trial in that earlier case was continued, pending the new charges. The new case has not been publicly filed.
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