A Great Neck man was sentenced to six years in prison after he provided two people — his girlfriend and a friend — with the heroin that would go on to kill them both, Queens District Attorney Melinda Katz announced on Thursday.
Justin Lum pleaded guilty to charges of criminally negligent homicide and drug possession in the separate incidents in November 2020 and was sentenced to an indeterminate term of three to six years in prison in Queens Criminal Court on Thursday, April 8, according to Katz. In both deaths, Lum had supplied the victims with heroin shortly after they had recovered from a previous overdose, the charges state.
On April 27, 2017, Lum was went to a movie theater with his 28-year-old girlfriend Patricia Collado, according to Katz. Using heroin before the movie, the pair used again while sitting inside a parked car outside of the theater, according to the charges. Collado, who was from Brooklyn. started to experience an overdose and Lum called for emergency services.
Collado was given Naloxone and taken to a nearby hospital to be treated.
Lum arrived at the hospital and stayed until Collado was discharged around 11 p.m., according to Katz. The pair went to Lum’s grandfather’s house in Flushing, where they snorted Lum’s heroin, according to Katz. Collado almost immediately went into cardiac arrest.
This time, according to the charges, Lum didn’t call for medical care and instead tried to revive Collado himself. With Collado still in need of medical attention, Lum continued to use drugs until he fell asleep, Katz said. He woke up at 8 a.m., the following morning to find Collado unconscious. He then called 911 and gave his girlfriend CPR until EMS personnel arrived.
Collado was pronounced dead at the scene. The medical examiner later determined that she had died as a result of an overdose of the combined effects of fentanyl, heroin and cocaine.
A little less than a year later, on March 1, 2018, Lum sold heroin to Bayside resident Calvin Brown, the charges state. Brown used the heroin inside Lum’s home and immediately had a medical emergency, according to Katz.
Lum called 911 and gave 24-year-old Brown CPR until medical help arrived. Brown was taken to a nearby hospital, given treatment and released from the hospital almost a week later on March 6.
On March 9, 2019, Brown went back to Lum’s home and again bought heroin, Katz said.
The next day, Brown’s mother found the 24-year-old dead inside their Queens home, according to the charges.
The medical examiner later determined that Brown had died of an overdose of the combined effects of heroin, alprazolam, diazepam and phenobarbital.
This story first appeared on QNS.com.
