Drug dealer goes to prison after fatal overdose, South Carolina prosecutor says
A drug dealer has gone to prison after deadly overdose, according to the 5th Circuit Solicitor’s Office.
On March 18, Ryan Clayton Bowers pleaded guilty to involuntary manslaughter and possession with intent to distribute a Schedule I or II controlled substance, the solicitor’s office said Wednesday in a news release. Bowers has become the first person to plead guilty to an involuntary manslaughter charge in Kershaw County under a death-by-distribution theory, according to the release.
Judge Heath Taylor sentenced Bowers to 5 years in a South Carolina Department of Corrections prison, the solicitor’s office said. Bowers began serving his sentence March 19, and is currently being held in Columbia’s Kirkland Reception and Evaluation Center, prison records show.
The conviction is connected to the 2024 death of Phillip “P.J.” Guinn, the solicitor’s office said in the release.
On Jan. 4, 2024, Kershaw County Sheriff’s Office deputies responded to a 911 call about an unresponsive man at a Camden home, according to the release. Law enforcement officers found Guinn, who had died from a narcotics overdose, the solicitor’s office said.
Investigators discovered a small plastic bag with fentanyl near Guinn’s body, according to the release.
A text thread showed Guinn asking Bowers for Suboxone strips, the solicitor’s office said. When Bowers realized he didn’t have Suboxone strips he provided Guinn fentanyl instead, attempting to replicate the effect despite the risk of overdose, according to the release.
Guinn overdosed and died, the solicitor’s office said. He’s survived by a daughter among other family members, according to his obituary.
Fentanyl was made to be a pain-relieving drug. The synthetic opioid is also about 50 to 100 times more potent than morphine and 50 times more potent than heroin as an analgesic, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
More than 53,000 deaths from overdoses were reported in the U.S. in 2024, and 34,000-plus involved fentanyl, according to the CDC.
In 2025, the South Carolina Legislature passed a law to address deaths from fentanyl, enabling law enforcement to charge suspects believed to have supplied fentanyl to someone who dies from using the drug to be charged with fentanyl-induced homicide, The State previously reported.
The Kershaw County Sheriff’s Office Narcotics Unit led the investigation into Guinn’s death.
Assistant Solicitor Michael Bradbury led the prosecution for the solicitor’s office, while public defender John Rieber was listed as Bowers’ attorney, Kershaw County court records show.
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