The death of Tex William Thompson, 42, was ruled a suicide by a Coroner’s Jury hearing evidence on 22-23 February.
Mr. Thompson’s body was found hanged at a construction site in West Bay on 2 January 2006.
Queen’s Coroner Valdis Foldats said the inquest is a formal court hearing that allows for investigation into circumstances surrounding a sudden death. No one is on trial at an inquest, he said, and the court is not looking to lay blame or find fault.
The first witness was Dr. John Heidingsfelder, government pathologist. Dr. John did not work in Cayman in January 2006, but he was able to explain the autopsy report filed by another pathologist.
He also commented on photos from the scene. He said everything was consistent with death by hanging and nothing he had seen was inconsistent with hanging.
For example, he discussed the hyoid bone, which is a horseshoe-shaped bone above a person’s voice box. That bone is frequently broken when people die by having their neck squeezed. But that bone was intact in Mr. Thompson’s body, so it was consistent with not having died of manual strangulation.
A member of the public asked if he knew any cases of a person being strangled without the hyoid being broken. Dr. John said yes, but then there were bruises to the neck or fingernail marks or other injuries or signs of struggle.
In Mr. Thompson’s case, there was a rope burn around the neck, a scrape to the top of his head and a laceration to his right foot. Pictures of the scene showed some blood on the ground. Dr. John said it had drained from the foot, but did not appear to be enough for loss of blood to have been the cause of death.
Pictures also showed Mr. Thompson’s toes touching the ground. Dr. John said this was not unusual. He had seen cases in which the individual’s head was as little as two feet from the ground. All that is required is compression to the neck until the person becomes unconscious.
He said the person becomes unconscious from diminished blood flow to the brain. This could take perhaps 15 seconds, depending on how the ligature is pressing on the blood vessels in the neck.
A lab report showed Mr. Thompson’s blood/alcohol level to be .123, with .100 considered intoxicated for driving purposes.
With that level, Dr. John said, you might expect some degree of mental confusion, some loss of critical judgment, perhaps some emotional instability. Physical coordination would be affected, but there was a lot of variation from one person to another.
Dr. John also explained a DNA analysis report. Blood samples had been taken from the front of the T-shirt Mr. Thompson was wearing. Those samples matched the blood of Mr. Thompson’s girlfriend. The likelihood of the blood belonging to anyone else was about one in 37 quadrillion.
The coroner called other witnesses who said Mr. Thompson had spent 1 January at his girl friend’s house where they were preparing to host a party that evening.
After the party, he had an argument with her in the house and choked her. She lost consciousness and blood came out of her eyes, nose and mouth. Some of the blood got on him.
She was not dead, but he went outside and told two people he had killed the only woman he ever loved, so he was going to kill himself because he did not want to go to prison. He took a piece of rope from the yard and left.
The girlfriend’s mother also gave evidence. She said that on the night before these events, she had been sitting outside with Tex. He was drinking a beer, but not drunk. He told her his best friend had died recently after being sick. He cried and said he didn’t feel like living any more because his best friend was gone.
The final witness was the police officer who responded to the report of the body being found on the afternoon of 2 January. He examined the construction site where the body was found. There were steel rods and hurricane straps extending upwards from the belting of the structure, to which the rope was attached.
There were two concrete blocks not far from Mr. Thompson’s feet.
The officer did not observe any signs of foul play. He saw only one set of footprints. There were no drag marks and no sign of any altercation in the area.
Mr. Thompson’s body showed no scratches or marks of violence, the officer said. He drew jurors’ attention to one of the scene pictures that showed a concrete nail in a wall and blood on the wall.
It was consistent with Mr. Thompson hitting his foot on the nail while coming over the wall.
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