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*A tribute fence will be installed inside the grounds of Prince’s Paisley Park home and music studio in anticipation of fans marking the second anniversary of his death.
The fence will also display fan messages and artifacts that Paisley Park has archived, Paisley Park announced Monday.
Officials also revealed new details about Celebration 2018, the second annual gathering for Prince fans from April 19-22. Ten more guest speakers have been added, including The Revolution members Bobby Z, Dez Dickerson and Matt Fink.
The celebration includes a concert called “Prince: Live On The Big Screen” at Target Center in Minneapolis, where fans can also leave messages on a specially erected fence.
Meanwhile, a toxicology report from Prince’s autopsy, obtained Monday by The Associated Press, shows he had what experts call an “exceedingly high” concentration of fentanyl in his body when he died.
Prince was 57 when his body was discovered in a Paisley Park elevator on April 21, 2016. Public data released six weeks later showed he died of an accidental overdose of fentanyl, a synthetic opioid 50 times more powerful than heroin.
Experts who are not connected to the Prince investigation said the confidential toxicology report obtained by the AP leave no doubt that fentanyl killed him:
“The amount in his blood is exceedingly high, even for somebody who is a chronic pain patient on fentanyl patches,” said Dr. Lewis Nelson, chairman of emergency medicine at Rutgers New Jersey Medical School. He called the fentanyl concentrations “a pretty clear smoking gun.”
The report says the concentration of fentanyl in Prince’s blood was 67.8 micrograms per liter. The report explains that fatalities have been documented in people with blood levels ranging from three to 58 micrograms per liter.
The report also says the level of fentanyl in Prince’s liver was 450 micrograms per kilogram, and notes that liver concentrations greater than 69 micrograms per kilogram “seem to represent overdose or fatal toxicity cases.”
There was also what experts called a potentially lethal amount of fentanyl in Prince’s stomach. Dr. Charles McKay, president of the American College of Medical Toxicology, said generally speaking, the findings suggest Prince took the drug orally, while fentanyl in the blood and liver suggest it had some time to circulate before he died.
Experts say there is no “lethal level” at which fentanyl can kill. A person who takes prescription opioids for a long time builds up a tolerance, and a dose that could kill one person might help another.
Search warrants released about a year after Prince’s death showed authorities found numerous pills in various containers around Paisley Park. A lab report obtained by the AP shows many of the pills tested positive for fentanyl and other drugs. Information that has been released publicly indicates the source of those drugs hasn’t been determined.
Last week, the lead prosecutor in the county where Prince died said in a statement that he was reviewing law enforcement reports and would make a decision on whether to charge anyone “in the near future.”
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