PHILADELPHIA — After years of controversy and requires change, the Philadelphia Medical Examiner’s Workplace on Monday issued a report affirming its ruling that the 2011 stabbing demise of a Manayunk trainer was a suicide.
Ellen Greenberg, 27, was discovered with 20 stab wounds within the house she shared together with her fiancé on the night of January 26, 2011.
Within the 32-page report, Chief Medical Examiner Dr. Lindsay Simon mentioned Greenberg would have been able to inflicting accidents on herself, noting that there was no signal of a wrestle on the scene nor any signal of an intruder.
Simon mentioned Greenberg’s fiancé’s assertion that he was on the fitness center on the time of her demise is corroborated by surveillance video, keycard swipes and different proof.
Simon additionally factors out that the fiancé’s DNA was not on the knife.
The health worker mentioned Greenberg was “a younger girl affected by anxiousness on the time of her demise.”
“The anxiousness appeared to principally be on account of her work as a trainer. She was particularly fearful that the grades she wanted to submit on the day of her demise would point out she had beforehand given inflated grades to her college students,” Simon continued.
RELATED: Hulu docuseries reexamines mysterious demise of Philadelphia trainer
The investigative collection options 20 new interviews with the household, buddies, and by no means earlier than seen crime scene images and post-mortem evaluation.
She wrote that Greenberg “expressed this anxiousness about her grades to buddies, co-workers, and her fiancé within the hours main as much as her demise.”
Simon mentioned Greenberg was beneath the care of a psychiatrist for her anxiousness, however “she didn’t survive lengthy sufficient to handle the anxiousness itself.”
“Thus,” Simon wrote, “she had a rise in vitality to behave on her anxious ideas.”
Whereas Simon concedes that the distribution of Greenberg’s accidents, which included a stab wound to the again of her neck, is uncommon, she mentioned Greenberg would have been able to inflicting the injuries herself.
The report additionally detailed three extra superficial stab wounds on Greenberg’s physique than what was documented within the unique post-mortem. Simon mentioned it doesn’t seem these three wounds contributed to any vital inside damage. Twenty extra bruises have been additionally newly documented, Simon mentioned.
The report was issued in the future earlier than the following court docket listening to on this case.
RELATED: Learn Dr. Simon’s full report on Ellen Greenberg’s demise
William Trask, the Greenberg’s household legal professional, blasted the findings in a press release to 6abc Motion Information on Monday:
“Simon’s so-called ‘unbiased evaluate’ of Ellen Greenberg’s demise is a deeply flawed try to justify a predetermined conclusion. It consists of false claims – just like the assertion {that a} stab wound in Ellen’s spinal column was made throughout post-mortem, a idea rejected by each credible professional, together with the Metropolis’s personal neuropathologist.
“By ignoring key proof that contradicts suicide-the in depth 3D photogrammetry, a recreation which proves Ellen couldn’t self-inflict the entire wounds, unexplained bruises, lacking surveillance footage, an intact lock, accounts of a poisonous relationship, and so forth. – Simon builds a flimsy case on distorted portrayals of Ellen’s psychological well being, propped up by cynical distortions of Ellen’s managed anxiousness, a situation extensively skilled day by day by over 40 million People.
“Disgrace on Dr. Simon. This report is a humiliation to the Metropolis and an insult to Ellen and her household. Ellen’s household simply needed the reality. It’s clear the reality is not going to come from Philadelphia’s legislation enforcement equipment. Although Ellen’s metropolis turned its again on her, we’ll proceed by different avenues to get justice for her homicide, by any means vital.”
The evaluate of Greenberg’s demise got here after a settlement between her household and the Metropolis of Philadelphia, who’ve been preventing to have the suicide ruling for greater than 14 years.
Shortly earlier than the settlement, Dr. Marlon Osbourne, the pathologist who carried out the post-mortem, mentioned in a court docket doc that Greenberg’s demise “must be designated as one thing apart from suicide.”
Osbourne had initially labeled the demise a murder earlier than altering it to suicide two weeks later.
Dr. Osbourne mentioned within the court docket submitting, “Since issuing the amended demise certificates, I’ve grow to be conscious of extra data,” and “it’s my skilled opinion Ellen’s method of demise must be designated as one thing apart from suicide.”
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