OLD ORCHARD BEACH — The recent deaths of a former town councilor and a young woman from Saco have been determined to be accidental.

Dana Furtado, 44, and Amber Morrow, 21, were found dead at Furtado’s Cascade Road home around 7 p.m. Jan. 23, according to police.

Officers discovered the bodies when they were at the home doing a wellness check at the request of friends and family members who had been unable to contact Furtado or Morrow.

Mark Belserene, spokesman for the Office of Chief Medical Examiner, said in an email Wednesday that Morrow had died of acute intoxication of the combined effects of fentanyl, ethanol and the over-the-counter antihistamine diphenhydramine and Furtado died of acute intoxication of the combined effects of fentanyl and ethanol.

Both deaths are considered accidental, said Belserene.

According to information on the National Institute on Drug Abuse website, fentanyl is a powerful synthetic opioid that is similar to morphine but is 50 to 100 times more potent. It is typically used to treat patients with severe pain or to manage their pain after surgery.

Furtado, a father of two children, owned a roofing company, had served as a town councilor and on The Ballpark Commission, was active in the local community group OOB365 and was a referee for high school football.

Andrew Morrow, the father of Amber, said the Chief Medical Examiner’s Office said there was no evidence the drugs were injected.

He said he checked his daughter’s arms for track marks and found none.

Andrew Morrow believes his daughter did not know she was taking straight fentanyl, and believes she thought she was taking heroin or some other drug and instead was given fentanyl, which is deadlier and cheaper than heroin.

Andrew Morrow, a firefighter and emergency medical technician, said his daughter was not an addict.

He said they lived in the same household, and he would have seen the signs if she was.

“It’s very hard to hide. She’s not an addict. She just made a mistake,” he said.

Amber Morrow was transgender and faced many struggles to gain acceptance from others as a teen and young adult, he said.

Andrew Morrow said his daughter may have wanted an escape, something to block her pain.

Old Orchard Beach Police Captain David Hemingway said the case is under investigation and police are still trying to identify where the drugs came from.

— Staff Writer Liz Gotthelf can be contacted at 282-1535, ext. 325 or [email protected].