Ellen Greenberg’s family seeks to overturn ruling she committed suicide after being stabbed 20 times

For greater than a decade, the household of a lady stabbed 20 occasions — together with 10 from behind — has battled to have the Philadelphia medical expert’s ruling that her demise was a suicide overturned.

Ellen Greenberg, a 27-year-old trainer, was discovered lined in bruises and stabbed to demise in her house throughout a blizzard greater than a decade in the past. Regardless of the blood-soaked crime scene, proof her physique had been moved and stab wounds to the again of her cranium, investigators discovered “no proof of a battle within the kitchen space or wherever else within the house.”

Dr. Marlon Osbourne, a former pathologist on the Medical Examiner’s Workplace in Philadelphia, initially dominated the demise a murder, primarily based on the accidents, then backtracked and revised the style of demise to suicide after conferring with metropolis police, in line with a civil lawsuit from Greenberg’s household.

An appeals court docket heard arguments in a civil lawsuit this week and can determine whether or not it might probably transfer to trial.

Legal professionals on either side of the attraction made their circumstances earlier than a three-member panel of the Commonwealth court docket Tuesday, Joe Podraza, an lawyer for Greenberg’s dad and mom, informed Fox Information Digital.

“We’re cautiously optimistic that the panel will discover the property of Ellen Greenberg might proceed to trial on her mandamus and declatory actions in opposition to the Metropolis (of Philadelphia) and Dr. Osbourne in order that the style of her demise could also be modified from suicide to one thing else,” he mentioned. “Solely then can we start to safe justice for Ellen.”

He mentioned he expects the panel to achieve a choice within the subsequent three to 6 months.

“[The] judges had been well-prepared and versed concerning the points,” he mentioned. “The judges additionally displayed the correct diploma of sympathy over Ellen’s demise and the horrible circumstances surrounding her demise.”

Greenberg’s fiancé Sam Goldberg referred to as police on Jan. 26, 2011, to report coming dwelling to search out her lifeless within the kitchen of their Philadelphia house, in line with court docket paperwork. 

In accordance with Podraza, proof reveals that a minimum of two of the 20 stab wounds had been inflicted after Greenberg’s coronary heart stopped beating.

A number of investigators who reviewed the case informed Fox Information Digital they disagree with Osbourne’s findings.

“I used to be startled by the quantity of questions that remained,” Man D’Andrea, a former murder prosecutor with the Philadelphia District Legal professional’s Workplace, informed Fox Information Digital in September.

Earlier than leaving the DA’s workplace, D’Andrea carried out a assessment of the case and mentioned he believed “at a minimal” the reason for demise ought to have been “undetermined.”

“Reviewing the file and the crime scene images and the medical expert’s images, I don’t understand how you come to that conclusion (of suicide),” he mentioned.

4 key items of proof induced him to doubt Osbourne’s discovering of suicide, he mentioned. A wound to the highest of her head, the truth that she was discovered seated upright, however blood had dripped sideways throughout her face — indicating that she had been moved — a considerable amount of bruises at totally different levels of therapeutic, and the fiance’s declare that he broke the locked door down when crime scene photographs present the latch nonetheless connected to each the door and the body.

A number of forensic pathologists, together with Dr. Cyril Wecht, one of many nation’s main specialists within the subject, reviewed Dr. Osbourne’s findings over time and located the circumstances “strongly suspicious of murder.”

“In all my years of expertise, and all the homicides that I’ve achieved, and suicides, I’ve by no means seen something like this,” he informed Fox Information Digital earlier this yr.

However metropolis officers keep a complete investigation discovered no proof of murder.

Individually, after referrals backwards and forwards relating to the case between the Philadelphia district lawyer’s workplace and the state lawyer normal, the Chester County district lawyer’s workplace has assigned an investigator and a prosecutor to conduct an outdoor investigation into Greenberg’s method of demise.

“We must watch for the Chester DA’s response to know the following steps,” Podraza mentioned of these proceedings. “If she finds a foundation to proceed with a murder investigation, we must see if her workplace retains it, it goes again to [Philadelphia District Attorney Larry] Krasner, or a particular prosecutor is assigned.”