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Local charged with exposing child to drugs

By Dean Shalhoup - Senior Staff Writer | Mar 1, 2019

Staff file photo Police cruisers were parked outside 89 Elm St. in Nashua in 2017, when detectives investigated a report of a child poisoned by illegal drugs, which led to the arrrest of Charles Daye.

NASHUA – Charles Daye, the Nashua resident facing various drug-related charges that include allegations he exposed a 1-year-old child to a near-fatal dose of fentanyl, remains in jail awaiting an opening in Nashua’s Adult Drug Court, according to a review of his case heard in court Thursday.

In the meantime, parties in the case are in the process of scheduling a meeting with the probation department, which is expected to take place within 14 days, according to Superior Court Judge Jacalyn Colburn.

At the time of his arrest in November 2017, Daye was jailed on $100,000 cash-only bail. However, on a more recent bail order in his court file, the amount shows $49,999 cash-only bail.

The order, dated March 2018, noted a recommendation Daye enter the county’s Substance Abuse Treatment Community for Offenders program (SATCO), if corrections officials deem appropriate for him.

It also noted Daye “shall not be released on the bracelet,” a reference to an electronic ankle monitor.

Nashua Police photo Charles Daye, age 26, last known address, 52 Bowers Street, Nashua

Neighbors on Sept. 1 awoke to find several police cruisers and unmarked detectives’ cars parked around 89 Elm St., where several hours earlier the 1-year-old child’s mother arrived home to find him “unconscious, not breathing … and his skin was blue,” according to police reports.

When her attempts to revive him failed, Daye “grabbed him and ran him to the hospital,” the reports state. Daye then left the hospital, police said, and was later found back at the Elm Street apartment.

The child’s mother, meanwhile, told police she had to bang on the door several times before Daye, who was babysitting the 1-year-old and the woman’s other young child, came to the door.

Daye said he was sleeping, which triggered an argument between the two, police said. When she ran upstairs to check on the children, the other child told her the 1-year-old “just made a funny noise,” the reports state.

Detectives, in searching the apartment at the outset of their investigation, seized a small bag of white powder, a small cutting of carpet covered with white powder and a cutting of bedding with white powder, police said.

A subsequent lab analysis identified the powder as fentanyl, and medical tests performed on the child at the hospital found cocaine in his urine and fentanyl in his bloodstream, police said.

Doctors, they added, confirmed that the symptoms were consistent with an opioid overdose.

Due to the child’s condition, he was transferred to a Boston hospital. When he was released several days later, police said, doctors said they expected him to make a full recovery.