(CNN) Before Jameek Lowery left a New Jersey police station and boarded an ambulance early Saturday morning, he felt paranoid and agitated, fearful that police were trying to kill him.

By the time the ambulance arrived at the hospital minutes later, he was unresponsive, Passaic County Prosecutor's Office said.

Lowery, 27, died early Monday at the hospital in Paterson and questions about what happened to him have sparked protests in the city and are now the focus of a prosecutor's investigation.

On Thursday, several officials and family members who had interacted with Lowery were informed that he had meningitis, according to Kathleen Long, chief of staff for Paterson Mayor Andre Sayegh.

Mayor Sayegh had met Lowery at an unrelated business opening on December 29, so he was given antibiotics as a precaution on Thursday, the mayor said. First responders and others in contact with Lowery were also told to go to St. Joseph's University Medical Center for antibiotic treatment as a precaution, the mayor said.

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