Finding into death of Natasha Calleja

32y · Female·combined drug toxicity, mainly heroin

Natasha Calleja, 32 years old, died from combined drug toxicity (mainly heroin) while an involuntary inpatient at Swanston Centre psychiatric unit after her de facto partner supplied heroin during an unsupervised visit. She had been admitted following erratic driving behaviour and was stabilised on Category 2 observations. Critical failings included: lack of visitor screening despite known substance use risks, unsupervised access to private spaces with a visitor of known drug involvement, and failure to educate patients and visitors about overdose risks after abstinence. Heroin's interaction with her prescribed psychotropic medications (diazepam, amitriptyline) increased toxicity. The coroner did not find compulsory searches warranted but recommended enhanced visitor protocols including pocket searches by consent, prominent overdose risk warnings on visitor sheets, and multilingual information for non-English speaking families.