REPORT - TWINS DIED OF DRUG OVERDOSES

LAKELAND -- Jennifer Foster and Charlotte Johnston, the 44-year-old twin
sisters and former Tampa police officers found dead inside a Lakeland motel
room in April, died of accidental drug overdoses, the Polk County Medical
Examiner's Office has ruled.

Large amounts of cocaine were found in the sisters' systems along with
diphenhydramine, which is found in Benadryl, and acetaminophen, the active
ingredient in Tylenol, according to a Medical Examiner Office toxicology
report.

Syringes were found inside the room, the report said.

"In my opinion, the cause of death is cocaine toxicity and the manner is
accident," wrote Medical Examiner Dr. Susan Ignacio, who conducted the
tests for both sisters.

On April 8, a hotel manager found the sisters' bodies -- one on the bed,
one on the floor -- after forcing the door to Room 223 at Days Inn motel on
East Memorial Boulevard.

The door was locked from the inside. The curtains were drawn and pinned
together.

There were no signs of suicide or foul play.

The deaths capped an astonishing downward spiral for the women, who once
won accolades for their citizenship and police work on the streets of Tampa.

At 17, both girls, whose maiden name was Rowse, were named "Teenager of the
Month" by the Dunedin Elks Lodge. Johnston joined the National Honor Society.

The sisters joined the Tampa Police Department in the 1980s -- Foster in
1982 and Johnston in 1986.

The earned a reputation for toughness and were respected by citizens they
served, records show.

Foster was known on the street for targeting drug dealers who preyed on
children.

One citizen wrote to Johnston: ". . . You got my van back from my husband.
. . . you were the only person who cared enough to do something for me."

In 1988, while trying to arrest a suspect, Johnston's partner, Officer
Porfirio Soto, was killed.

"It was a tough time," Steve Cole, the Tampa Police Department's spokesman
in 1988, told The Ledger in April. "She was really struggling."

Johnston leaned on her sister's shoulder, thinking Foster, a fellow
officer, would understand, said Cole, now the spokesman for the U.S.
Attorney's Office in Tampa.

Both sisters sought medical discharges. Eventually, they left the
department voluntarily -Johnston in 1990 and Foster in 1991.

"It was a very unusual, complicated situation," Cole said. "They were so
close, and they were suffering from the same kind of trauma."

Eventually, arrests on drug, fraud and battery charges landed both sisters
in jail.

Records show the women had been arrested in Polk and Marion counties during
the past decade.

They began to show up regularly in Polk County, where their mother lives,
in 2000.

Both had been arrested for cocaine possession, fraud, domestic battery and
probation violations, according to Florida Department of Law Enforcement
Records.

Johnston had been arrested at least 10 times since 1998. Foster had been
arrested at least eight times since 1995.

Most recently, the women were released from the Polk County Jail on Feb. 7.