Since the initial Texas DPS post last February, we've learned more facts from both Unidentified Persons/Namus and the Harris County Institute for Forensic Sciences-- which I'm referencing to help clear up a few discrepancies that it appears are being perpetuated about the unidentified male.
Reportedly, the young man was unresponsive when located inside an abandoned bus (school bus??) and transported to a hospital (Ben Taub) where he later expired. The ME determined the young man was a victim of suicide. However, I don't think a violent injury the reason that the photo was edited to add a t-shirt to the corpse.
While DPS Missing Persons Clearinghouse records provide the decedent's
cause of death as suicide, this is incorrect.
Suicide is in fact the manner of death, and the cause of death is not yet released per the available links.
Throughout the country, including Harris County, TX, there are generally
five manners of death (natural, accident, suicide, homicide, and undetermined), where manner is the determination of how the injury or disease leads to death.
To be clear, the
cause of death is the specific injury or disease that leads to death. For example, asphyxiation is the 2nd leading cause of suicide in the U.S.
I could not find any linked evidence that supports hanging.
Reportedly, the youth was found unresponsive inside a bus at 6260 Westpark Drive, Houston, Tx -- an area where people are known to loiter.
The address also corresponds with a 115,001 square-foot, twin modern professional high-rise building in the middle of Houston, near the Galleria, an upscale shopping mall (see building lot photo at the link below). It's also known as the Westchase neighborhood, which is known for its connection to the oil industry.
I believe the lot area is checked often and probably why the victim was soon transported to a hospital where he later died. I also wouldn't be surprised if the lot was used for off-site parking for Galleria employees where they're shuttled to the mall and the bus left in the lot overnight. Given the month of January, I think it plausible the young man entered the bus for shelter from the cold.
Last but not least, at the moment of death, all of the muscles in the body relax, a state called primary flaccidity. Eyelids lose their tension, the pupils dilate, and the body's joints and limbs are flexible.
And more likely than not, the jaw often falls open. This is very natural and certainly not any indication of a specific cause of death as some have posted.
For example, I can attest how less than a week ago, while at the bedside of a dear old friend when she expired, her mouth was open very similar to the unidentified decedent. The difference here was probably that she was a patient at a private hospice facility where available staff soon attended and placed a couple of rolled-up hand towels beneath her chin and neck area to lift the jaw and/or close the mouth, while we waited for the funeral home to collect her body. IMO, the unidentified victim likely died in the ER and was transported to the morgue, when convenient-- where he was later photographed in his natural state.
Texas Missing Persons Clearinghouse Online Bulletin, Browse photos and searchable bulletins of missing persons, abductors, and unidentified persons, a central repository for information and pictures of missing and unidentified persons in Texas.
www.dps.texas.gov
View NamUs unclaimed person case UCP87935 for -- -- missing from Houston, Texas. Date body found: Jan 10, 2022. NCMEC case number: --.
namus.nij.ojp.gov
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