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SYDNEY - A 36-year-old NSW south coast man has been charged with manslaughter after allegedly poisoning six people with mixtures of prescription drugs, leading to at least two deaths.
Police from Strike Force Mawarra swooped on a rural property near Nowra today at 1.30pm (AEDT) and arrested a local man, who was later charged with two counts of manslaughter and four counts of using poison to endanger life.
The strike force was established in May 2006 to investigate the deaths of two men in 2004 and alleged poisoning of four other people between 2000 and 2005.
Detectives also believe there are other victims in the community who experienced similar incidents and are yet to come forward.
It is alleged the victims in each instance were supplied with quantities of two different prescription drugs which, when taken together, led them to fall ill.
One victim, 22-year-old Shaun Bateson, was found unconscious in a boarding lodge in the southern Sydney suburb of Miranda on May 1, 2004.
He was taken to Sutherland Hospital but remained in a coma and died three days later.
A second victim, Brian Hadfield, 29, had died only six weeks later, in a hostel at Surry Hills in inner-Sydney.
A 22-year-old woman was left in a critical condition for six days after consuming a quantity of pills at a house in Taree in June 2000.
The other three victims, two men aged 40 and 20 as well as a 17-year-old girl, took a quantity of the combination of the drugs over several days while on a road trip from Nowra to Sydney and back in January 2005.
The 20-year-old man and the teenage girl were both hospitalised while the other man was sick at home for two days.
Police are also urging anyone else who believes they may has been victim to such an incident to come forward while investigations will continue.
The Nowra man has been refused bail and will appear in Nowra Local Court this morning.
- AAP
