Doctor: Saginaw homicide victim Cassandra Nelson stabbed 54 times, drowned 'on her own blood'

Andy Hoag | By Andy Hoag | The Saginaw News
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on March 09, 2012 at 1:20 PM, updated March 09, 2012 at 2:01 PM
Cassandra3.jpgCassandra Nelson

SAGINAW — Cassandra Nelson was stabbed 54 times Jan. 31, but that's not how she died, a medical examiner testified this morning.

Saginaw County Medical Examiner Kanu Virani testified during the second part of Lashon T. Hollman's preliminary hearing that Nelson, 28, instead died as a result of, essentially, “drowning on her own blood.”

Virani explained that Nelson experienced bleeding around her brain, likely the result of blunt force trauma to her left upper cheek. The injury likely knocked Nelson unconscious or, at the least, partially unconscious, the doctor testified, and blood that came from that injury as well as a stabbing to her lip traveled to her lungs.

Virani said he believed Nelson was unconscious because she did not spit the blood out and instead aspirated on the blood.

“She could not have survived more than a few minutes,” Virani testified.

Nelson's stab wounds mostly were on her upper back, the back of her neck, and the back of her head, the doctor said. None of the wounds were deep enough to injure any major blood vessels or Nelson's spinal cord, the doctor testified.

Virani was one of five witnesses to testify this morning in the hearing before Saginaw County District Judge A.T. Frank, who ruled that prosecutors showed probable cause to take Hollman, 20, to trial in Circuit Court,

Hollman.Lashon.Terrel.jpgLashon T. Hollman

Hollman, who lived at 703 W. Holland, is charged with first-degree premeditated murder, felony murder, torture, and carrying a dangerous weapon with unlawful intent in Nelson's death at 923 N. Harrison.

Nelson and Hollman, who lived at his mother's house, were neighbors.

Hollman's mother, Suzette Collins, testified today that at Nelson's request, she took Nelson and Hollman on Jan. 30 to a store on West Genesee, where Nelson intended to purchase a cellphone. Hollman and Nelson, who “occasionally would spend time” with each other, Collins said, went into the store to buy the phone, Collins testified.

They returned to Collins' home, where Nelson used Collins' home to activate her new phone, Collins testified. A short time later, Nelson left, Collins said.

Saginaw Police Detective Joe Grigg testified today that when he and other officers searched Nelson's home Feb. 2, when Nelson's body was found, they did not locate the phone nor Nelson's purse, bridge card, or cash.

The felony murder charge that Hollman faces means that somebody was killed during the commission of a specified felony. Prosecutors list those felonies as torture and larceny.

Hollman's best friend, Quamay Henne, testified during the first part of Hollman's preliminary hearing last month that Hollman confessed to killing Nelson. Henne testified that Hollman told him he “stabbed the (expletive) out of her.”

Virani, the medical examiner, testified that it is “quite possible” that a broken television found near Nelson's body was the object used to cause the blunt force trauma that Nelson sustained.

The doctor said Nelson's death would have been “inevitable” — even from the stab wounds — if her attacker had left the house and locked the door, as county Assistant Prosecutor Paul Fehrman asserted today.

Fehrman argued that probable cause existed for Hollman to stand trial on both murder charges.

Nelson's stab wounds would have caused her “at least slight discomfort,” Fehrman said sarcastically, and caused her anxiety that she was about to die.

“This took a while to accomplish, obviously,” and Hollman had time to think about what he was doing, the prosecutor said.

Hollman's attorney, James F. Gust, argued that probable cause didn't exist to establish that Hollman should stand trial.

“What it appears here,” Gust said, “is that someone was likely trying to kill the victim but not doing a very good job of it. It was an unprofessional way of killing somebody by somebody who didn't know what he was doing.”

Still, the attorney argued, Fehrman didn't show probable cause that Hollman was the killer or that he stole Nelson's belongings.

Hollman remained jailed today without bond.

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