Thread: Beyond Bizarre

Georgia teen was stuffed with newspaper after death, family lawyer says
By Elizabeth Chuck, Staff Writer, NBC News



Kenneth and Jacquelyn Johnson talk about the death of their son Kendrick, whose body was found rolled up inside a wrestling mat. Attorney C.B. King also joins.

The mysterious death of a Georgia teen has taken a bizarre twist with the revelation that an autopsy of his exhumed remains found his internal organs missing and his body stuffed with newspaper.

The family of Kendrick Johnson, 17, of Valdosta, Ga., was "outraged" and "devastated" by the discovery and believes his death was a murder that is being covered up, a lawyer representing them said Thursday.

Johnson, a three-sport athlete, was found dead on Jan. 11 in a rolled-up wrestling mat in his high school gym. State medical examiners concluded that he accidentally suffocated while trying to retrieve a sneaker.

But his parents, Kenneth and Jacquelyn Johnson, were doubtful about that conclusion. "It didn't make any sense," Kenneth Johnson told MSNBC's Tamron Hall on Thursday. "We know how Kendrick is, we know he would have never crawled up in no mat."

In June, they won a court order to have Kendrick's body exhumed for a second autopsy.

What the private pathologist who performed the second autopsy found was shocking. The results came back in September. "There were no organs in there," Benjamin Crump, co-counsel for Kendrick's family, said. "He [also] concluded that it was a homicide, and that he died from blunt force trauma."

The autopsy showed Kendrick suffered hemorrhaging on the right side of his neck.

Organs from the teen's torso up to his skull had been removed and replaced with newspaper after his death, Crump said, something that disturbed his parents terribly. "They thought that they had their whole son returned to them. They only had half of their son returned to them," he said.

All of his clothes were also missing. "It's very hard for we as parents to have to go through this ordeal," said Kenneth Johnson.

Kendrick's body had been in three places after he died: possession of the local sheriff when the crime occurred; the Georgia Bureau of Investigation, which conducted the first autopsy in January; and the Harrington Funeral Home in Valdosta, which handled the embalming and burial, according to Crump.

Harrington Funeral Home and the Valdosta sheriff did not return a request for comment from NBC News.

Sherry Lang, director of public affairs at the Georgia Bureau of Investigation said, "We stand behind our medical examiner's office and their autopsy report on this case. We returned the organs with the body to the funeral home. It's our policy and it's our practice on every single autopsy that we do."

On Thursday, Kendrick's parents announced they planned to seek legal action against government officials who may have had involvement in covering up their son's murder. "To find his organs are missing is just insult on top of injury," Crump said. "They're outraged. They've been outraged for the last nine months."

He added that the death of the track, basketball, and football star, who he described as a "good kid," left the family "devastated."

"We know that there at least four video cameras, one of which is aimed directly in the area where the mat is that his body was located," King said. "What does this video show? We can't help but believe it would be the clearest proof of whether or not the sheriff's theory is correct. It would show him getting into the mat, or if doesn't show that, it would show how his body wound up in the gym the following morning."

Lowndes County High School declined to comment.

King said a U.S. attorney is examining Kendrick's file and is considering opening up an investigation into his case.

Crump said Kendrick's parents feel the cover-up is limited to their son, but want to know why it happened. "A lot of people in the community believe they know who did this [the murder]," he said. "The question is why was it covered up. Right now we think that the truth is right under our noses and it's going to come out. This murder mystery will be solved."

He would not disclose who the family suspected was responsible for the death.

http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013...cid=ansmsnbc11

Kendrick Johnson investigation: Feds will not file charges
High school student found dead in a rolled-up gym mat

By Victor Blackwell CNN UPDATED 4:24 PM CDT Jun 20, 2016

(CNN) —There will be no charges filed in the 2013 death of Kendrick Johnson, the U.S. Justice Department said Monday, citing insufficient evidence in the Valdosta, Georgia, case.

A medical examiner determined in 2013 that Johnson died of "positional asphyxia" after he was found dead in a rolled-up gym mat at Lowndes High School.

Officials from the U.S. attorney's office met with Johnson's family Monday and informed them the investigation had concluded, the Justice Department said.

"The Department of Justice, in particular the lawyers and investigators who have worked tirelessly on this investigation, express their most sincere condolences to Kendrick Johnson's parents, family, and friends," Acting United States Attorney Carole Rendon said.

"We cannot imagine the pain of their loss, or the depths of their sorrow. We regret that we were unable to provide them with more definitive answers about Kendrick's tragic death."

The investigation

Four months after Johnson's body was found in a gym mat, the Georgia state medical examiner concluded he had died as the result of accidental "positional asphyxia," implying Johnson had suffocated as a result of being trapped upside-down in the rolled-up mat.

The teen's parents never believed the local authorities' explanation that the 17-year-old teen got stuck in the mat after diving in to retrieve a shoe.

His parents, Kenneth and Jacquelyn Johnson, later had his body exhumed and hired an independent pathologist to performed a second autopsy on Johnson's body.

In the second autopsy, two months later, a medical examiner concluded Johnson's death was a result of a homicide.

Evidence of "blunt force trauma to the right side of Kendrick's neck, near the jaw, and the manner of death was not an accident," the Justice Department statement details. "He found hemorrhages to the jaw line area not detected during the GBI autopsy."

In January, Johnson's parents filed a $100 million civil lawsuit against dozens of local and state officials and claim officials helped plot to fake evidence.

"We know Kendrick was murdered, no ifs ands or buts about it," Jacquelyn Johnson, Kendrick's mother, told CNN moments before entering the courthouse to hear the final fate of her son's case.

Federal investigators hold firm that a comprehensive investigation was conducted surrounding the of the events in Kendrick's death.

"The investigation included, among other things, interviewing nearly 100 people; reviewing tens of thousands of emails and text messages; reviewing surveillance videos from Lowndes High School; and analyzing other available information regarding the events of January 10-11, 2013," the DOJ statement said.

"That just pushes the dagger a little bit further," Jacquelyn Johnson told reporters in a news conference after hearing the final verdict. "All we ever asked for were answers and the truth about what happened to Kendrick and they still haven't given us any answers."

The Johnsons affirmed that investigators told them the initial autopsy conducted by the state medical examiner was wrong and the autopsy performed by the independent pathologist they hired, which indicates their son's death was the result of blunt force trauma, was correct.

The DOJ is not commenting beyond the statement it released, saying the investigation "has been closed without the filing of federal criminal charges."

http://www.kcci.com/national/kendric...arges/40140552