photo by: Kansas Department of Corrections

William Martin Byrd, left, and Mason Duane Robinson

Two men were charged Wednesday in Douglas County District Court in connection with the drug death of a person.

The men, William Martin Byrd, 36, of Lawrence, and Mason Duane Robinson, 26, of Lawrence, have both been charged with one count of distribution of a controlled substance leading to death, a level-one felony. The charges relate to an incident on April 14. The court documents listing the charges for both men and the list of witnesses are identical.

Byrd was arrested by Lawrence police around 2 p.m. Tuesday near the intersection of Seventh and Connecticut streets, and Robinson was arrested around noon Tuesday at the Lawrence Police Department Headquarters, 5100 Overland Drive.

The men appeared before Judge Blake Glover on Wednesday afternoon, and he set a cash bond of $100,000 each. Neither man had posted bond as of Wednesday evening. Both Byrd and Robinson are next scheduled to appear in court on June 22.

The arrests are connected to an incident report by the Lawrence Police Department on April 14, when medical personnel were called to the 1900 block of Miller Drive for an overdose or accidental poisoning, according to police incident reports.

A 23-year-old woman, Angelyca LeAnn Cowdin, of Lawrence, who was connected to an address in that block died on April 14, 2022, according to a local obituary.

The Douglas County District Attorney’s Office declined to confirm whether Cowdin was the decedent in the case.

Byrd was convicted of a level-five felony drug possession in November of 2018, according to the Kansas Department of Corrections.

Robinson has numerous convictions in Douglas County, including felony criminal threat in 2017 and felony burglary in July of 2019, and he was on post-release supervision as of January 2022, according to the Kansas Department of Corrections