2 Ole Miss Students Discovered Dead

The University of Mississippi has identified the two students who died Monday, Sept. 21, as 18-year-old Aidan Hamilton, a freshman from Englewood, Colo., and 20-year-old Robert Strang, a junior from Atlanta.

Hamilton was found unresponsive on campus and died after CPR attempts. Strang died off campus. Toxicology reports are not yet available, and the cause of each death remains under investigation.

The Lafayette County Metro Narcotics Unit said packaged kratom purchased from a retail store was found during both death investigations. Investigators have not determined that kratom or any other substance contributed to either death, and they have said there is no confirmed evidence linking the two.

Lafayette County Coroner Glenn Coleman confirmed the ages of the two students. The 18-year-old died in a residence hall on the Ole Miss campus. The 20-year-old died at a house off campus.

A 1:30 p.m. call to Stewart Hall

Public safety officials were sent to Stewart Hall just after 1:30 p.m. Monday for a report of a “possible overdose,” according to a Lafayette County dispatch recording. First responders were told the person was unresponsive and that CPR was already in progress.

Strang was found at an off-campus house on Van Buren Avenue. Authorities have released almost nothing about the circumstances of that death.

Both students were male, the coroner's office told Fox News Digital. Both died Monday, in what law enforcement is treating as two separate death investigations.

What the narcotics unit actually said

The Oxford Police Department posted the Metro Narcotics release the day after the deaths. “Law enforcement is currently conducting two separate death investigations. At this time, we have no confirmed evidence indicating that the two deaths are connected,” it read. “However, packaged kratom sold from a retail store was found during both investigations. Out of an abundance of caution, we encourage everyone to avoid kratom and any other medication or substance that was not prescribed to you or obtained from a trusted, regulated source.”

Kratom comes from a plant and produces opioid-like effects. It is sold without FDA approval, which means no agency checks what is actually in the package on the shelf.

It is not illegal across Mississippi. Oxford banned it years ago, and it is also banned in Lafayette County. Tennessee made kratom illegal this summer. Arkansas had already banned it.

Strang's family asks for privacy

“We are heartbroken by the loss of our dear son, Robert, and are trying to process this unimaginable loss,” Strang's family said in a statement released through a family spokesman, Scott Sayres. “We are deeply grateful for the incredible outpouring of love, prayers and support by so many beloved friends and family.” The family asked for privacy in the days ahead.

Strang belonged to the Mississippi Alpha Chapter of Phi Delta Theta. The fraternity said it held off on any public comment until his name was released.

“The loss of two young lives is a profound tragedy,” the fraternity said, adding that it joins the university and the broader Ole Miss community in mourning Robert and Aidan Hamilton.

The state moves to speed up toxicology

Gov. Tate Reeves said Wednesday that the Mississippi Department of Public Safety and the Mississippi Bureau of Narcotics are assisting Oxford law enforcement and working to expedite toxicology results.

“Mississippi is praying for the families and friends of the two Ole Miss students during this incredibly difficult time,” Reeves said. He went on to warn about illegal drugs on college campuses, though no one has determined that illegal drugs caused either death.

Colonel Phillip Pope, who leads the state Bureau of Narcotics, offered students a blunt rule: take only medication a doctor prescribed and a pharmacy dispensed.

Attorney General Lynn Fitch's office had posted just a week earlier that it trained Ole Miss students on how to administer Narcan. After the deaths, Fitch said her office reached out to partners including the Magee Center and HarborPath to surge resources to campus. “One Pill Can Kill is not just a slogan. It's a fact,” her statement said.

Oxford's Narcan machines are getting emptied

The City of Oxford installed a Narcan vending machine in July. Since then it has dispensed 865 products, 550 of them Narcan and 147 of them fentanyl test strips.

Between Sept. 17 and Sept. 22, people pulled Narcan from the machine 80 times and fentanyl test strips 24 times. After the deaths, free Narcan dispensers in dorms and in a parking garage near the Square were emptied out, WMC Action News 5 reported.

Jared Foster, who owns The Velvet Ditch in downtown Oxford, said he is stocking free Narcan, fentanyl test strips and CPR mouth barriers in vending machines inside his restaurant and its women's restroom. Foster expected 30 more boxes of supplies Thursday. He described keeping Oxford's students supplied as his mission.

Senior Eliza Cavness said the deaths made the case for campus Narcan dispensers feel suddenly real.

The university is fighting the rumor mill

Within a day, claims were circulating online that more Ole Miss students were dead or unaccounted for. The university said that is false.

“We are aware that considerable unverified information is circulating on social media and in the community regarding these recent student deaths,” the university said in a written statement. “The Coroner's Office has confirmed two student deaths, and University Police are not aware of any additional student deaths.”

Dr. Shawnboda Mead, vice chancellor for student affairs, asked students and the public not to speculate about the circumstances or repeat anything that has not been officially confirmed while local, state and federal authorities work the cases.

The school pointed students toward the University Counseling Center and UMatter: Student Support & Advocacy for grief counseling. Anyone struggling with substance use can call the SAMHSA National Helpline at 1-800-662-4357.

Black ribbons, canceled parties, tighter bar security

Black ribbons went up outside fraternity houses on campus. Kenneth Tonos, a student who works security for multiple fraternities and sororities, told Fox News Digital that at least three Greek-life events had been canceled after the deaths, and that some Oxford bars were tightening screening to track what people carry inside.

A third student, Mary Harvey, told Fox News Digital she believes she was drugged at an Oxford bar Saturday night while watching the Rebels play LSU. Harvey said her memory cuts out around the end of the game, after she fell down. Police put her in an Uber back to campus, by her account, and her roommate found her unconscious in a dorm hallway after searching several floors. Harvey said she no longer feels safe in her own building.

Student Ethan Prince said a friend knocked on his door that morning to check on him. Sophomore Jay Van Dyke first heard something was wrong in his biology class, when a classmate got a message saying someone had died in their dorm. “You just almost want to stay inside and that is silly,” Van Dyke said.

Gabe Evans said he learned about it at 10:30 Tuesday morning and found social media full of frustrated parents and frightened students. “The reality is that we live in a time where students have to be extremely cautious of what they are consuming and who they are taking it from,” Evans said.

Parents in town are having harder conversations

“We're startled, kinda mortified about what's going on around here,” Ole Miss parent Josh Christian said. He said he has already told his 11-year-old and 8-year-old girls not to trust a pill just because it looks like what someone claims it is.

Greg Thompson, another parent in Oxford, called the deaths heartbreaking. “It hits home when you realize these are kids that y'know we see around town,” he said. Thompson, a doctor, said the only reason he knew what kratom was is his job. His wife, Lisa Thompson, said she had never heard of it before the deaths.

A synthetic opioid Greek chapters started warning about

Several fraternities and sororities sent members warnings about cychlorphine, a synthetic opioid that does not register on standard fentanyl test strips. The notices told members to avoid any substance not prescribed to them and to give naloxone immediately if an overdose is suspected.

Investigators have released nothing linking cychlorphine to either death.

Dr. Lucas Trautman, medical director for the Oxford Treatment Center, said the compound is the newest one showing up in the supply. “They're creating new synthetic opioids to put in the supply instead of fentanyl, and cychlorphine is the newest and most dangerous,” Trautman said. He said his staff sees a new synthetic opioid about once every other month.

Where the case stands

Two separate investigations remain open. No cause of death has been determined for Hamilton or Strang, and toxicology work is still pending, with state agencies now helping move it along.

Whether other drugs were involved at either scene is still an open question. The only physical detail investigators have released from both locations is the packaged kratom bought at a retail store, and they have repeated that its presence proves nothing about how either student died.