A report in the Newsday newspaper Thursday said soil samples taken from the river did not match the soil type found in Daniel's body.
The paper said forensic pathologist Dr Valery Alexandrov, who did the first autopsy on the child, met for several hours Tuesday with homicide officers probing Daniel’s death.
The report said police gave Alexandrov soil samples collected from the riverbed of the Tarouba river where police found Daniel’s body on February 20. It said the doctor conducted his own tests on the samples and concluded that they did not match those of soil residue found on Daniel’s body on February 20.
Alexandrov said he is now of the view that Daniel did not drown in the river where his body was found.
“That body was too clean when it was found and the only marks we found during the autopsy were a few scratches on the face of the child, which is not consistent with a child falling into a river and then being swept for miles before the body ended up where it was found,” Alexandrov said.
“If Daniel drowned in the Tarouba river, his body would show signs of multiple wounds such as cuts, bruises and even broken bones, but in this case, the body was clean and devoid of the substance found in the riverbed at Tarouba.”
He added that the body did not have any mud on it when it was found on February 20, which is another cause for suspicion. However, he still maintains that Daniel died from drowning but it was not at the Tarouba river.
Alexandrov was one of two forensic pathologists who carried out the first autopsy on the body of the boy at the Forensic Science Centre on February 22.
Pathologist Dr Herbert Daisley did a second autopsy and concluded that the child died from asphyxia along with blunt force trauma to the chest. The government brought in an American expert to do a third autopsy, which stated that Daniel died from homicidal asphyxia.
No comments:
Post a Comment