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The family of Dennoriss Richardson is pushing back against an Alabama state autopsy that claims a Black man who was found hanging in an abandoned home in late September died by suicide.
According to AP, in late December, Alabama released Dennoriss Richardson’s autopsy, which ruled the 39-year-old’s death a suicide.
Despite the state’s findings, the Alabama Department of Forensic Sciences didn’t immediately provide a copy of the autopsy results to the public, which has led to more questions about the autopsy’s validity. Leigh Richardson, Dennoriss Richardson’s wife, says she also has not seen the official autopsy and remains steadfast in the belief that her husband did not commit suicide.
The sheriff’s department has “been saying he committed suicide from the beginning within five days of investigation,” Leigh Richardson said in a statement. “This is why we are fighting for the truth. This has not been easy by any means. However, we know that “NaNa” did not kill himself.”
In September, 39-year-old Dennoriss Richardson was found hanging in an abandoned home in a rural part of Colbert County, Alabama, miles away from his home in Sheffield. The Colbert County Sheriff’s Office ruled Richardson’s death a suicide. Still, Sheriff Eric Balentine confirmed the FBI accepted his request to investigate the hanging, saying his department “exhausted all resources” in its investigation.
“We feel confident in what our findings were, but we feel like by doing this we can give the family more peace of mind,” Balentine said.
Leigh believes her husband’s death was connected to a lawsuit he filed against the local police department in February 2024. The suit alleged that while Richardson was in jail, he was assaulted, denied medical attention, sprayed with tear gas and tased. Leigh also noted that her husband did not leave a suicide note and that he had no connection to the house where he was found.
A private autopsy was conducted by Richardson’s lawyer in late December, which said that “A thorough and meticulous investigation should be carried out to rule out staged suicide.”
The private autopsy conducted by forensic pathologist Dr. Adel Shaker affirmed the state’s findings that Dennoriss Richardson died from “Asphyxia Secondary to Neck Compression,” which is consistent with hanging.
Roderick Van Daniel, the attorney who represented Dennoriss Richardson in his civil rights lawsuit against the Sheffield Police Department, told AP something isn’t right about the investigation.
“This whole investigation is suspicious,” said Van Daniel. He continued, ”This family and community are tired of the evasive answers and lies being told to them.”
Local activists and other Black community members were also skeptical of the suicide ruling based on the region’s history of lynching and the more recent history of police brutality and racist misconduct in Colbert County. AP noted that in Alabama, “there were 359 reported lynchings between 1877 and 1943, according to the Equal Justice Initiative, a criminal justice reform nonprofit,” and that 11 of those lynchings happened in Colbert County. But far more concerning is the behavior of Colbert County cops, which has been much more recent.
Dennoriss Richardson’s attorney, Van Daniel, spoke at his client’s funeral in early October, saying that Richardson “believed in transparency and accountability” and that he “stood up against police misconduct.”
“His family and the Sheffield community deserve answers,” Daniel said. “We deserve answers.”
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