An up-and-coming manner designer who dressed Lady Gaga and other celebrities was murdered in her Manhattan apartment with a lethal cocktail of fentanyl and other prescription drugs final year, cops and stories mentioned Friday.
A neighbor spotted Kathryn “Katie” Gallagher’s keys dangling from the door of her apartment on Eldridge Avenue on the Lower East Facet and entered to check on her — then discovered her lifeless entire body facial area up on her bed, a police supply claimed.
The mysterious loss of life of Gallagher, 35, was labeled as a murder Friday right after the clinical examiner established that she died from acute intoxication from the mixed results of fentanyl, ethanol and the designer opioid p-Fluorofentanyl.
The promising designer was the victim of grand larceny in what detectives feel could be connected to a pattern of at the very least 26 current “drug-facilitated” robberies in parts like the East Village, the Reduce East Side and the Bronx, law enforcement sources claimed.
Cops are also probing no matter whether Gallagher’s dying is linked to Kenwood Allen, 33, who was arrested in December and billed with murder in the overdose robbery fatalities of two clubgoers in the Decrease East Side, police sources explained.
Allen — who has not been charged in connection to Gallagher’s dying — is allegedly a member of a vicious gang that has repeatedly drugged inebriated revelers and robbed them. Police are also on the lookout into no matter if two of his co-defendants are linked to Gallagher’s dying.
“They concentrate on their victims leaving bars, presenting medicines in some instances, then both as a result of power or when the victim passes out, they take out jewelry, money, significant-end watches and phones from their victims,” NYPD Chief of Detectives James Essig claimed at the time of Allen’s arrest.
Gallagher was “a painter and internationally identified style designer” who opened her eponymous label in New York Metropolis in 2010, according to an obituary released by the Rhode Island School of Style and design, Gallagher’s alma mater.
Around the last ten years, her get the job done was showcased in magazines such as Vogue, Glamour, and W, and her collections were worn by superstars like Laverne Cox, Rita Ora, and Lady Gaga. Kourtney Kardashian and singer Rita Ora also dressed in her clothes.
In advance of her outfits line took off, she worked as a bartender at Flats Repair Taqueria & Tequila Bar on East 16th Street and Broadway in the East Village in 2016, a worker there instructed The Submit.
It wasn’t obvious how the drugs got into her program or no matter if anything at all was stolen from her apartment.
A memorial service for Gallagher was held in her house point out of Pennsylvania in August, and a celebration of life is scheduled for this May possibly.
Gallagher’s loved ones released a GoFundMe website page to raise income so the promising artist’s last assortment can be done. They hope to existing her operate in the Big Apple this fall.
Gallagher is survived by her mother and father, grandmother, and three sisters, who were “so proud of who she was and all she obtained in her temporary but full and stunning existence,” in accordance to her obituary.
“Fiercely independent and confident of her eyesight, Gallagher followed her very own path in daily life and in manner,” a Vogue tribute to her read.
Additional reporting by Natalie O’Neill and Desheania Andrews