Authorities have arrested a man suspected of selling drugs to a Southern Methodist University student who died this month, apparently from an overdose.

James McDaniel

James McDaniel, 46, was arrested Wednesday afternoon at an apartment in the 6000 block of Auburndale in University Park. He was alive but unconscious when arrested, said Tela Mange, Texas Department of Public Safety spokeswoman. Ms. Mange said that she did not know why Mr. McDaniel was unconscious but that he was taken to a local hospital.

Mr. McDaniel was wanted for questioning in the death of 21-year-old Meaghan Bosch, whose body was found in a portable toilet near Waco. Police believe she overdosed, but the Dallas County medical examiner's office has not ruled on the cause of death.

Meaghan Bosch

Before her body was discovered, Mr. McDaniel told missing-persons detectives that he had lunch with Ms. Bosch a day before she was reported missing. Ms. Bosch had sent text messages to friends that she was with a drug dealer, believed to be Mr. McDaniel, within days of when her body was found.

Police have also questioned current and former boyfriends and other associates in connection with her death.

Mr. McDaniel was arrested on warrants for aggravated sexual assault and parole violation.

In December 2005, a 32-year-old woman told Dallas police she had been drugged and raped a few days earlier. Police put DNA in that case into a database, and the sample matched Mr. McDaniel's profile.

Authorities were still investigating whether the victim was drugged when Mr. McDaniel's name surfaced in the Bosch investigation. Police do not believe Ms. Bosch was sexually assaulted.

Mr. McDaniel also served 22 years in prison for the murder of a former Dallas police officer. He was convicted of killing James Burt Horan, 33, in 1979. He was released on parole in 2001.