Kaepernick-Funded Autopsy Reportedly Finds Trey Reed Didn’t Die by Suicide — Family Attorney Ben Crump Hasn’t Confirmed

Although unconfirmed by Reed's family, a new cause of death claims spread online.

According to an update to a report from The Chicago Crusader, activists who are working with the family of Demartravion “Trey” Reed and a verified source who is not authorized to comment publicly, the independent autopsy commissioned by Colin Kaepernick’s Know Your Rights Camp Autopsy Initiative, which has not yet been released to the public, will confirm what Black people already instinctively suspected: Reed did not die by suicide, as the Cleveland (Mississippi) Police Department initially alleged.

As previously reported by BLACK ENTERPRISE, after Reed’s family and civil rights attorney Benjamin Crump challenged the initial ruling that the Delta State University student died by suicide on Sept. 15 and demanded transparency and a thorough investigation, Colin Kaepernick’s organization stepped in to fund an independent autopsy to uncover the truth.

Per a report from the Mississippi Clarion-Ledger, although the official autopsy has not yet been released to the public, some of the initial commentary and rumors around his death, amplified on social media, connected his death with the death of a white homeless man, Cory Zukatis, whose death was also ruled a suicide.

As they noted, the Southern Poverty Law Center found that there have been at least eight suspected hangings of Black men and teens in Mississippi since 2000. Like Reed’s case, local authorities have ruled that these deaths were self-inflicted, that is, death by suicide, while their families cast doubt on the official narrative, given the historical context of lynchings in Mississippi and other Southern states.

Part of the reason for the rampant speculation and conspiracy theories being spread online can be traced to a podcast, wherein Krystal Muhammad, the chair of the New Black Panther Party, asserted in a conversation with rapper Willie D that Reed’s mother talked to her about what is reportedly in the autopsy report.

It should be noted that both the Southern Poverty Law Center and the original Black Panther Party have denounced the “New” Black Panther Party and said that it bears no association with the original group.

In addition to this, misinformation about Reed’s death spread after the initial autopsy was released. A person behind an account who claimed to be Reed’s cousin alleged that he had injuries, specifically broken bones, that would have made death by suicide physically impossible. Although the creator deleted those videos, they had already gone viral online.

As Terry Wilson, the founder of the Idaho chapter of the Black Lives Matter Grassroots chapter, told the Crusader, the response from Black Americans is rooted in a shared historical memory and context. “This sophisticated machinery of racial terror is just a fascist strategy that relies on overwhelming force from multiple directions, including misinformation, intimidation and threats,” Wilson said. “I think we’re witnessing a coordinated campaign of disappearances, lynchings and state sanctioned killings that target Black, Brown and Indigenous communities.

He continued, “We need to address this method of ‘lynchings by suicide’ which is their way to rationalize, from a medical standpoint, their feelings. I think this is sort of a death rattle for white supremacy, because they’re relying on almost every structural institution in order to justify or cover up the actions of folks.”

However, according to The New York Times, the 20-year-old Delta State student, Jy’Quon Wallace, who happened upon Reed’s body, while he is sympathetic to the family of Reed, absent the release of the second independent autopsy, he isn’t inclined to automatically tie Mississippi’s past to the body he found.

“We’re just trying to look out for one another. A lot of people are trying to use this situation to kind of make it seem like it’s racially motivated. There’s a lot of signs pointing to this as not a racially motivated situation. When that whole story comes out, if it does come out, then it may give some people clarity. It may not. That’s not up to us,” Wallace told the outlet.

Mississippi’s Republican Gov. Tate Reeves took a similar tack in his response to the incident, noting in his official statement, “Speculation from people who have no facts or evidence has dominated online conversations and even some national mainstream media outlets in the immediate aftermath of this tragedy,” to Gov. Reeves, the response “represents a sad state of affairs in today’s social media driven world.”

Perhaps this was always going to be the route that a suspicious death in Mississippi took, regardless of rumors fueled by social media, or the incident’s timing, following the attempt by the right to sanitize the legacy of Charlie Kirk, a white nationalist, after he was allegedly killed by Tyler Robinson, who had reportedly become disillusioned by Kirk’s beliefs.

Michael Peeler, Delta State University’s Director of Public Safety, and the second officer who arrived at the scene of Reed’s death, acknowledged that an independent investigation of Reed’s death could draw a very different conclusion from the original statements from the police department, but noted that whatever the conclusion, he believes that it will be based on facts.

“Once the investigation is over, then folks can see for themselves. I’m not a fortune teller, but I can tell you that they will see the facts,” Peeler told the New York Times.