MACON – While speaking to reporters Monday in Macon, Kenneth and Jackie Johnson announced the Department of Justice had ended a probe into the circumstances of their son’s death but claimed investigators confirmed the findings of their privately-funded autopsy, which determined Kendrick Johnson was murdered.
However, the U.S. Attorney’s Office conducting the investigation repeated its conclusion on Tuesday, stating it found insufficient evidence and have closed the case.
Jackie Johnson’s comments raise questions about why federal investigators would close a case if they concluded Anderson’s findings were accurate and Johnson was murdered.
Johnson’s body was found upside down in a vertically-stored gym mat at Lowndes High School in January 2013. A state autopsy ruled the 17-year-old’s death accidental, theorizing that he became trapped after squeezing himself into the mat while reaching for a pair of shoes.
Johnson’s parents have insisted their son died of foul play. In the summer of 2013, Johnson’s body was exhumed, and a privately-funded autopsy was performed by Dr. William Anderson. Anderson determined Johnson died of blunt-force trauma to the neck and that the manner of death was homicide.
On Monday, Jackie Johnson spoke with reporters after meeting with federal investigators. She said the investigators “all but came out and said they know (Kendrick Johnson) was murdered.” WCTV reported Johnson said investigators told her family that Anderson’s homicide findings were accurate.
Valdosta Today reached out to the Northern District of Ohio, the U.S. Attorney’s Office which was handling the investigation, to determine whether or not investigators did, in fact, find Anderson’s findings to be accurate and if the official finding of the investigation is that Johnson was murdered.
“The release speaks for itself,” said Michael Tobin with the Northern District of Ohio. “We did not find sufficient evidence to support federal criminal charges. We have no comments beyond the release.”
Valdosta Today also contacted the District Attorney’s Office for Georgia’s Southern Judicial Circuit and the Lowndes County Sheriff’s Office to determine whether federal investigators shared evidence of a homicide with those agencies.
Neither the DA’s Office nor the sheriff’s office have received any evidence from federal investigators, according to agency spokespersons, and the Kendrick Johnson case remains closed at the state and federal levels.
