Man dies of CO poisoning in parked car in Sisters
A 39-year-old man was found dead inside his station wagon parked on a Sisters street Saturday, having succumbed to carbon monoxide fumes after he fell asleep with the vehicle running, Deschutes County sheriff’s deputies said.
A citizen called the sheriff’s office around 3:30 p.m. Saturday to request a welfare check on a homeless person living in a white station wagon on Rail Way near Arrowhead Trail in Sisters, said sheriff’s Lt. Chad Davis of the agency’s Detective Division. The location is on a public street on the west side of Sisters, near several businesses, he said.
A sheriff’s deputy responded and found a man deceased in a 2001 Ford Taurus station wagon, Davis said. Medics from the Sisters-Camp Sherman Rural Fire District also responded to the scene.
Sheriff’s detectives and the county Medical Examiner’s Office soon responded to conduct a death investigation.
Davis said they concluded the victim, later identified as Edward Carlton Fones, 39, of the small Eastern Oregon town of Fossil, had gone to sleep in the vehicle with the motor running.
The station wagon was surrounded by snow, causing the exhaust fumes to fill the car from the underside, Davis said. An investigation determined Fones succumbed to carbon monoxide poisoning and had died at the scene.
Davis told NewsChannel 21 it appeared Fones had been running the car to provide warmth from the heater. He said it was not running at the time it was found and had been off for several hours.
Fones last had been seen on Thursday night and had been working at a Sisters business for several months, Davis said. A citizen working in the area called and requested the welfare check. There is no evidence of foul play, Davis said, adding that Fones’ family had been notified.
“The Deschutes County Sheriff’s Office would like to remind the public that sleeping in a vehicle can be very dangerous,” Davis wrote in a news release. “If citizens find themselves needing to sleep in their vehicle with the engine running, open a downwind window slightly for ventilation and periodically clear snow from the exhaust pipe. This will protect you from possible carbon monoxide poisoning.”
