It’s been 24 hours since Philip Seymour Hoffman was tragically found dead in his bathroom after an apparent drug overdose and already the NYPD is vigorously searching for the troubled actor’s drug dealer.
Police are stepping up efforts after nearly 70 glassine envelopes of heroin were found in his Greenwich Village apartment, according to the NY Post, labeled “Ace of Spades” and “Ace of Hearts.”
“An internal email went out to all supervisors asking if anyone has had any experience with those brand names of drugs,” a law enforcement source told The Post. “They’re going to try to find the source.”
Only, this isn’t the first time those markings have been mentioned in the press in relation to a soaring heroin epidemic in Manhattan.
In 2009, the Drug Enforcement Agency in New York busted a heroin trafficking ring and arrested 13 men in Long Island where 5,000 packets were found labeled Ace of Spades and other markings.
Ace of Spades heroin has also been found in other parts of the country, including Witchita, Kansas, where police arrested 12 men in 2011 after seizing about 100 bags of the drug stamped with the word ‘Ace’. And police made another arrest as recently as Jan. 16 after 44 bags of heroin were found being transported from New York to Connecticut with the Ace of Spades brand.
The 46-year-old actor, who had a long battle with drug use and went through a 10-day detox program last year, was found Sunday with a hypodermic needle stuck in his arm.
The thespian spoke for the first time about his drug use in 2006, during a 60 Minutes interview: “It was all that [drugs and alcohol], yeah, it was anything I could get my hands on… I liked it all,” he said of his early years after graduating from NYU. “I went [to rehab], I got sober when I was 22 years old. You get panicked… and I got panicked for my life. It really was just that.”
The three-time Tony Award nominated actor will be honored when Broadway theaters dim their lights in his memory Wednesday, according to the AP.
The actor leaves behind his longtime partner, Mimi O’Donnell, and their three children.
