Photo: Elijah McClain | By Allison Sherry, CPR News | New information from the grand jury investigation into the death of 23-year-old Elijah McClain prompted the Adams County coroner to amend the official autopsy report, potentially giving prosecutors a stronger case to charge the three police officers and two paramedics involved in his violent arrest with manslaughter.
In 2019, a contract pathologist for the Adams County coroner conducted McClain’s autopsy seven days after he died and found both the cause and manner of death to be “undetermined” — rather than a homicide.
After multiple attempts of trying to obtain that amended autopsy, CPR News on Thursday night sued the Adams County coroner to get the new report.
Coroner Monica Broncucia-Jordan confirmed to CPR News that the autopsy has been amended because of grand jury testimony. Autopsies are subject to Colorado Open Records Act.
That previously “undetermined” cause and manner of death for McClain made for a much higher hurdle to successfully hold those who arrested him and the paramedics who treated him accountable for his death, legal experts say.
Causes of death can vary widely, but manners of death are limited to homicide, suicide, accidental, natural or undetermined.
Former Aurora Police officer Jason Rosenblatt and officers Nathan Woodyard, Randy Roedema and paramedics Peter Cichuniec and Jeremy Cooper collectively face 32 criminal charges, including manslaughter, criminally negligent homicide and assault charges.
It was exactly a year ago this week that they were indicted, but their proceedings have dragged on with procedural delays and backlogged courts. They have an arraignment set for November.
McClain’s arrest and subsequent death
McClain was stopped by police on Aug. 24, 2019, after they received a call of someone walking down the street looking suspicious. [Editor: McClain was a violinist and loved animals].
McClain wasn’t suspected of committing any crimes and wasn’t armed, but officers still restrained him with two chokeholds, and paramedics later injected him with a large dose of ketamine. He went into a coma in an ambulance and was pronounced brain dead at the hospital on Aug. 27, 2019. McClain died three days later.
In May, The Denver Gazette obtained records that were supposed to be sealed by the court and reported that the contracted pathologist, Dr. Stephen Cina, said, “Mr. McClain would most likely be alive but for the administration of ketamine.”
Several things happened at the time of McClain’s initial autopsy that were not considered best practice, one leading industry expert told CPR News in 2020, including not seeking a second opinion when the first pathologist declared McClain’s cause and manner of death to be undetermined.
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Amended autopsies are rare
It’s extremely rare for autopsies to be changed after a death and it only happens if the pathologist or medical examiner discovers new information they didn’t have at the time of the examination, lawyers said.
In McClain’s case, the potential change in his death determination comes after a grand jury met behind closed doors for eight months in 2021.
Information from that investigation — tens of thousands of investigatory documents, interviews and forensic and physical evidence — is sealed from the public, but that information is what apparently led Broncucia-Jordan to change the death certificate.
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Lawrence Pacheco, a spokesman for the Colorado Department of Law, which is a special prosecutor on this case, had no comment for this story.
Sheneen McClain, Elijah’s mother, had no immediate comment on the story. The city of Aurora settled a lawsuit she filed against the police department for $15 million in November 2021.
Implications for the case against officers, paramedics
While not common, prosecutors can file charges of homicide and manslaughter in cases where the manner of death is undetermined — or if there is no body at all, experts said.
But the path to conviction is steep, said former Denver District Attorney Mitch Morrissey, who is not involved in the McClain prosecution.
Morrissey said that all murder charges, from first degree murder to criminally negligent homicide, require that the defendants be the cause of death. He said the more specificity in an autopsy, the better for a prosecution.
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Read the full story here:
https://www.cpr.org/2022/09/02/elijah-mcclain-death-autopsy-coroner-lawsuit-changed-grand-jury-testimony-manslaughter-prosecution-police/
Elijah McClain’s Autopsy Report Changed Ahead of Arraignments of the Officers, Paramedics Involved in His Violent Arrest
