Coroner Says Handcuffed Man Shot Himself in Chest, Rules Death Suicide
Harry Houdini he was not. Yet an autopsy report released this week found that a 22-year-old man managed to fatally shoot himself in the chest while seated in the back of a police patrol car with his hands cuffed behind his back.
After the March 3 death of Victor White III, the coroner’s office of Iberia Parish, La., released an official autopsy report detailing White's cause of death as suicide—but his parents still want answers.
Police arrested White while investigating a fight. Though he wasn’t involved in the altercation, White was arrested for an alleged narcotics violation.
What happened next is a matter of contention. Coroners say the gunshot wound was to White’s chest, but that’s not how the story was first told.
The Louisiana State Police said in its initial March 3 press release that White became uncooperative and refused to exit the deputy’s patrol vehicle.
"As the deputy requested assistance from other deputies, White produced a handgun and fired one round striking himself in the back,” reads the press release.
The coroner’s report states that the cause of death was “a single contact gunshot wound to the right lateral chest, and the manner of death is suicide.” The report maintains that despite his hands being cuffed behind his back, White could have manipulated his position to reach a hidden weapon “due to his body habitus.”
Body habitus is a medical term for physique. In this instance, it appears to indicate that White was something of a contortionist, able to twist and turn his bound hands to retrieve a gun and bring it to the front of his body.
“He is not Houdini. He is not David Copperfield, nor is he a descendant of either,” Carol Powell-Lexing, the White family’s lawyer, said Wednesday, according to The Daily Iberian.
Powell-Lexing also called the autopsy report “bogus” and a “cover-up of police brutality.”
This isn’t the first time a young black man has supposedly shot himself while handcuffed and in police custody. Chavis Carter, a 21-year-old black man, allegedly fatally shot himself in the head in 2012. The Jonesboro, Ark., police department faced similar scrutiny regarding the suspicious circumstances of Carter’s death. In an attempt to ease concerns, it released an unconvincing reenactment video to show how Carter could have reached his constricted hands into the back of his pants and then twisted his arms to shoot himself in the head.
The possibility of freakish flexibility aside, other aspects of White’s case are suspicious. The autopsy report does not reveal any testing of gunpowder residue on White’s hands, a typical practice in suicide cases.
The police reportedly searched White twice and found small amounts of marijuana and cocaine but missed a handgun. The coroner’s report details two lacerations on White’s face, but a man who was with White at the time of the arrest claims his face was clear, according to NBC News. The police department also maintains that there was no physical fight between White and the officers.
“My son didn’t shoot himself. I never believed it. I won’t believe it,” Victor White Sr., a Baptist minister, told KLFY News 10.
The family wants a federal investigation by the United States Department of Justice. It is also asking for a second opinion on the autopsy report by New York forensic pathologist Dr. Michael Baden. Baden performed the autopsy on Michael Brown, who was killed by a Ferguson, Mo., police officer earlier in August.
The Louisiana State Police is overseeing the case. It has declined further comment because the investigation is ongoing.
Related stories on TakePart:
• Why It’s Dangerous When Young Black Men Are Seen as Gangsters, Not Grads
• The Crowdfunding Page for the Officer Who Shot Michael Brown Is Bringing Out the Racists
• Trayvon Martin Joins a California March Against Police Brutality
• When White Cops Police Black Communities
Original article from TakePart
