Tristin Schiess Obituary News: 22-year-old Oregan Man dies After Taking Oxycodone While on on a family cruise in Mexico
While on a family cruise in Mexico, Tristin Schiess stopped by a pharmacy. His mother found him dead in his bedroom when he got back to Salem.
Tristin’s mother, Heather Schiess, misses every aspect of him. His inspiring attitude. His optimism. His sharp wit. and in particular his hugs.
She remarked, “He loved making others happy. He cherished assisting others.
So much so, according to Heather, that when her son left for college, he chose to major in nursing. The “boy with the big smile,” as Heather referred to him, began training to become a firefighter instead after he returned to Salem as a result of the epidemic.
For my kid, “the sky was the limit,” she added. “He was really animated. He cherished life. And he made the most of every moment.
The Schiess family, which included Tristin’s older brother and younger sister, decided to fly to Mexico for Thanksgiving last year in order to celebrate.
They traveled down and back up the Pacific Coast for seven days aboard the Norwegian Bliss, departing from Long Beach, California, with a final stop in the port city of Ensenada, a few hours south of San Diego.
Since the kids had started school, Heather and I had not taken a vacation in four years. It was simply very lovely. Everyone was enthusiastic.
Tristin passed away less than 48 hours later, less than two months after turning 22.
Tristin and his brother had been touring the shoreline of Ensenada when they decided to visit a pharmacy.
Heather discovered that Tristin had purchased some pills and brought them back on board the ship that evening at supper. He admitted they were oxycodone to his parents.
His mother added, “He was a young boy making a terribly horrible choice that day.
Tristin had been diagnosed with severe ADHD a year and a half earlier. His mother stated he was also dealing with some mental health concerns, though he didn’t like to talk about them.
As a parent, “you try your best,” she said. “You make an effort to maintain a dialogue. You let them know you’re available to help. You assist them.
That evening aboard the ship, she and Tristin’s father had a confrontation.
She recalled, “I tried to convince him to hand up the drugs. He also told me, “Mom, a couple of oxy aren’t going to kill me,” at the time.
The ship anchored in California the morning after Thanksgiving, and the family took a flight back to Oregon the following day.
She hoped that by going back to Salem, where she was from, her son would feel secure and that everything would “get back to normal.” The following morning, when she went to her son’s bedroom, she discovered his body. According to a police report, investigators discovered 19 pills in a toolbox on his nightstand.
She stated, “It was the clean M, the line, and the 30.” These “blue pills.”
A drug testing kit containing strips to check for fentanyl, a synthetic opioid that is 100 times more potent than morphine, was also found, according to documents.
If the test strips had been utilized or if Tristin had tested the drug or pills that took his life, Salem police were unable to confirm to KGW. While his mother couldn’t, she was certain of one thing.
Heather remarked that Trish “was terrified of fentanyl.”
She got the last toxicological result from the state medical examiner four months later. It revealed that Tristin had fentanyl, the anti-seizure medication clonazepam, and what seemed to be cocaine residue in his bloodstream. His passing was ruled to have been an accident.
Heather recounted, “It was like tumbling backward, like when I first found him. “However, this time, it was rage. I thought my son had been killed.
As it turns out, the issue of fake prescription drugs isn’t confined to just one area or even one Mexican drugstore.
Two months after Tristin’s passing, UCLA researchers published the results of a study in which they sent uninvited “shoppers” to 40 pharmacies catering to tourists in four locations in northern Mexico. They requested oxycodone, Xanax, and Adderall single pills. More than two-thirds of those pharmacies provided the study participants with the highly restricted medicines without a prescription.
To determine the composition of the tablets, researchers employed test strips and infrared light back in the lab.
The Xanax pills were all genuine, however meth was found in nine out of eleven (81.8%) samples that were advertised as Adderall. Fentanyl was included in eight of the 27 pills labeled as oxycodone (29.6%). Three of the 27 had heroin in them.
“We have this inherent trust in a pharmacy, that what we’re going to buy is actually something legit,” said Dr. David Goodman-Meza, an assistant professor of infectious diseases at UCLA. He also co-authored the study and has a specialty in travel medicine.