Autopsy Shows Gay Activist's Death Not Hate Crime;
Family Rejects Findings 04.01.07 By Anthony Cuesta
The family of the 72-year-old gay man whose death became a national focus for gay rights advocates said Thursday they reject an autopsy report stating that he died of natural causes.
According to the Associated Press, Wayne County Medical Examiner Dr. Carl Schmidt said Wednesday that Andrew Anthos died of injuries likely suffered in a fall, and that the evidence did not support reports that he had been the victim of a hate crime. Detroit police announced that they were closing the case. Anthos died Feb. 23, 10 days after relatives say he was beaten by a young man who called him a gay slur, followed him off a city bus and hit him in the back of the head with what Anthos thought was a pipe. "If you want to say he wasn't murdered, OK. But you can't say he wasn't attacked, that it wasn't a hate crime," Anthos' cousin Athena Fedenis told the AP. Anthos’ death had been widely reported by the news media as a hate crime.
On March 2, U.S. Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich., promoting new legislation, recounted on the Senate floor how an assailant "struck Anthos in the back with a metal pipe, leaving him critically injured, lying in the snow," reports the Detroit Free Press.
Matt Foreman, executive director of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, implicated religious conservatives soon after the death, reports the Free Press.
"The hatred and loathing that led to the vicious murder of Andrew Anthos only because he was gay is not innate," Foreman said in a statement. "Instead it is being taught every day by leaders of the so-called Christian right and their political allies."
But it was likely a simple movement, not a whack on the head, that felled the man, Schmidt said.
"He probably just flexed his neck," which caused arthritic spurs to compress his spinal cord enough to cause paralysis of his legs. After spinal surgery in the hospital, that numbness later spread to his upper body and caused Anthos to stop breathing, the Free Press quotes Schmidt saying. The only injury noted in the autopsy was a 2-inch-wide bruise on the back of Anthos' head, which likely came when he fell, Schmidt said. The injury was minor, he said.
According to the AP, the Triangle Foundation, a gay-rights advocacy group based in Detroit that has been counseling the family, said the case should remain open. It said that the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force is offering a $5,000 reward for information leading to an arrest and conviction in the case. "We absolutely believe that there was an attack based on (statements), especially Mr. Anthos' account," said Melissa Pope, the group's director of victim services, reports the AP. "It was based on the fact that he was gay, and therefore, a hate crime."
According to the Associated Press, Wayne County Medical Examiner Dr. Carl Schmidt said Wednesday that Andrew Anthos died of injuries likely suffered in a fall, and that the evidence did not support reports that he had been the victim of a hate crime. Detroit police announced that they were closing the case. Anthos died Feb. 23, 10 days after relatives say he was beaten by a young man who called him a gay slur, followed him off a city bus and hit him in the back of the head with what Anthos thought was a pipe. "If you want to say he wasn't murdered, OK. But you can't say he wasn't attacked, that it wasn't a hate crime," Anthos' cousin Athena Fedenis told the AP. Anthos’ death had been widely reported by the news media as a hate crime.
On March 2, U.S. Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich., promoting new legislation, recounted on the Senate floor how an assailant "struck Anthos in the back with a metal pipe, leaving him critically injured, lying in the snow," reports the Detroit Free Press.
Matt Foreman, executive director of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, implicated religious conservatives soon after the death, reports the Free Press.
"The hatred and loathing that led to the vicious murder of Andrew Anthos only because he was gay is not innate," Foreman said in a statement. "Instead it is being taught every day by leaders of the so-called Christian right and their political allies."
But it was likely a simple movement, not a whack on the head, that felled the man, Schmidt said.
"He probably just flexed his neck," which caused arthritic spurs to compress his spinal cord enough to cause paralysis of his legs. After spinal surgery in the hospital, that numbness later spread to his upper body and caused Anthos to stop breathing, the Free Press quotes Schmidt saying. The only injury noted in the autopsy was a 2-inch-wide bruise on the back of Anthos' head, which likely came when he fell, Schmidt said. The injury was minor, he said.
According to the AP, the Triangle Foundation, a gay-rights advocacy group based in Detroit that has been counseling the family, said the case should remain open. It said that the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force is offering a $5,000 reward for information leading to an arrest and conviction in the case. "We absolutely believe that there was an attack based on (statements), especially Mr. Anthos' account," said Melissa Pope, the group's director of victim services, reports the AP. "It was based on the fact that he was gay, and therefore, a hate crime."
This website will mostly focus on Lesbian issues, However, HATE is
and issue for us all.
and issue for us all.
1 comment:
The abrupt closing of this case by the Detroit Police is an outrage.
There are still way too many open issues, including the fact that Mr. Anthos did have a 2-inch bruise on the back of his head, but he fell forward, not backwards. Then there’s the witness who saw Mr. Anthos being followed and saw a man standing over him. Then there’s Mr. Anthos’ own deathbed statement.
The ME’s report does not (and cannot) rule out any of these plausible scenarios: (a) Mr. Anthos was struck on the back of the head (hence the bruise) and that caused his neck to jerk, triggering the chaine of events that led to his death; (b) Mr. Anthos was fleeing the assailant, tripped and the fall triggering the chain of events; or (b) Mr. Anthos was ducking a blow, and that triggering the chain of events. In any of these scenarios, a crime was committed.
As I said, it's an outrage that the police have closed this case. We - along with our colleagues at the Triangle Foundation - will continue to push for justice.
Matt Foreman
Executive Director
National Gay and Lesbian Task Force
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