ALBANY, N.Y. – Canadian officials say the death of the only inmate convicted of murder following the 1971 Attica prison uprising was an accident caused by alcohol and cocaine use.
The body of 61-year-old John Boncore was found March 13 in his home on the Adams Lake Indian Reserve in British Columbia.
The British Columbia coroner's office said Monday Boncore had an enlarged heart, had recently used cocaine and had a potentially life-threatening blood alcohol level of more than 0.35 percent when he died.
Boncore was a Mohawk Indian born in Buffalo. He was known as John B. Hill at the western New York maximum-security prison where 32 inmates and 11 civilian employees died during the five-day siege.
Boncore was convicted of fatally beating a guard but received clemency after a year.
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