New York. Death of writer Paul Auster’s son, charged over the death of his baby

The son of American writer Paul Auster, Daniel Auster, charged in mid-April with manslaughter after the overdose death of his ten-month-old daughter, died in New York on Tuesday, police said Thursday, with the press also speaking of an overdose.

Daniel Auster, 44, was found ‘unconscious’ on a subway platform in Brooklyn on the morning of April 20 and taken to hospital where he died on April 26, a New York police spokesperson said. . According to police sources quoted by the tabloid New York Post, Auster died of an “accidental overdose”.

His daughter Ruby died of “acute intoxication”

The 40-year-old was arrested, charged and released on bail ten days ago for manslaughter and criminal negligence against his daughter Ruby.

While in custody on November 1 at his home in Brooklyn, the baby was found unconscious. Hospitalized, the daughter of Daniel Auster had died of “acute intoxication due to the combined effects of fentanyl and heroin”, according to the police.

Paul Auster, 75, is one of New York’s most renowned writers, translated worldwide, author of the “New York Trilogy”, “Moon Palace” and “Leviathan”. He is married to American novelist and essayist Siri Hustvedt, but Daniel Auster’s mother is American writer Lydia Davis.

Fentanyl, a dangerous opioid

In Auster’s novel “The Night of the Oracle”, the narrator is a writer whose son is a drug addict.

The number of overdoses continues to rise in New York. They killed 1,233 people in the first half of 2021 (965 over the same period of 2020), 2,062 people in 2020, in the midst of a pandemic, affecting the poor and African-Americans more.

In question, in 77% of cases in New York in 2020, fentanyl, a powerful and dangerous synthetic opioid mixed with heroin or cocaine, a cocktail which killed the star of the cult series “The Wire”, Michael K. Williams, on September 6th.

–