No foul play in death of Georgia teen Kendrick Johnson, found head down in gym mat, says sheriff
A second investigation into the 2013 death of 17-year-old Kendrick Johnson turned up no new answers.
The Lowndes County Sheriff’s Office has closed the case again, writing off the Georgia teenager’s death as a “terrible accident,” Sheriff Ashley Paulk announced Wednesday.
Johnson was found dead on Jan. 11, 2013, at Lowndes County High School, stuck upside down in an upright mat behind the bleachers.
Officials ruled it “positional asphyxia,” saying he suffocated after getting stuck while trying to retrieve a shoe that had fallen in the center of the mat.
But Johnson’s parents, Kenneth and Jacquelyn Johnson, called for a deeper investigation after a third-party autopsy said he died from “unexplained, apparent non-accidental, blunt force trauma.”
Investigation reopened into Georgia teenager found dead inside gym mat
A sneaker and a sweatshirt stained with a liquid were left a few yards away from Johnson’s body, according to photos from the scene previously obtained by the Daily News. Investigators could not confirm the liquid and did not collect any as evidence.
In March, police investigated a new confession, sent on tape to Jacquelyn Johnson, but determined it was a hoax.
“All of the evidence, testimony, interviews, grand jury testimony and even the blatant coercion and intimidation of some persons being questioned does not produce anything to prove any criminal act by anyone that would have resulted in the death of Kendrick Johnson,” Paulk wrote in a 16-page synopsis of his investigation.
