Three pathologists dispute ruling of accidental death
The medical examiner reversed their homicide finding in the 1998 death. They still disagree.
By Associated Press
Published January 12, 2004
WINTER PARK - Three pathologists say the death of a Rollins College student almost six years ago was a homicide, despite a medical examiner's ruling that the 19-year-old woman died accidentally.
Jennifer Kairis' death on March 31, 1998, in her dormitory after a party was suspicious from the beginning. Her body was found on the floor and marked with bruises from blows to the head and neck.
A pathologists' report ruled it was a homicide, but Orange-Osceola Chief Medical Examiner Dr. Shashi Gore reversed the decision - calling it a mistake - and said Kairis died accidentally, likely of a drug overdose.
For the first time publicly, the pathologist who decided Kairis' death involved someone else is contradicting Gore's ruling.
"It was a homicide," Dr. Merle Reyes, who conducted Kairis' autopsy, told the Orlando Sentinel for a story Sunday. "I never changed my mind."
Gore declined repeated requests for comment.
Two other pathologists who signed off on the death as a homicide in August 1998, former Deputy Chief Medical Examiner Dr. William Anderson and Dr. Sara Irrgang, are siding with Reyes.
Gore's decision to change Kairis' cause of death was supported by Dr. Stephen J. Nelson, now head of the state Medical Examiner's Commission, as well as a pathologist working for Nelson.
Gore stepped into the case after being asked to review it by Winter Park police Lt. Art King, then a sergeant, who did not think there was any evidence of a homicide.
Records show that Orange-Osceola State Attorney Lawson Lamar's chief homicide prosecutor at the time and three veteran Orange County investigators reviewed the case and agreed that someone killed Kairis.
Winter Park's lone investigator also agreed but changed his mind after King took over the case.
Records show that Winter Park police never tested hair found to see whether it belonged to someone else. And specimens from the rape examination remained at the morgue for 10 weeks before they were taken to the Florida Department of Law Enforcement crime laboratory for testing, delaying the cause-of-death ruling, Reyes said.
The student's blood contained more than twice the toxic amount of a heart medicine occasionally prescribed to control migraines, two antidepressants, another drug for migraines and over-the-counter cold medicines, the autopsy found.
Police said she drank four mixed drinks and a beer at a restaurant before a party, passed out at the party and was taken back to her room.
Reyes now says she disputed Gore's finding, taking the autopsy photos and presenting the case without his knowledge in the fall of 1998 to pathologists and investigators in South Florida.
"We did agree that this did not look like an overdose," said former Palm Beach County Medical Examiner Dr. Jacqueline M. Martin, who attended the meeting.
Kairis' injuries were consistent with a struggle, Reyes said.
Police attributed Kairis' scrapes and bruises to falls at the party and during her drunken return home, records show.
