AP Headlines
Published: December 5, 2013 7:30 PM EST
Updated: December 5, 2013 7:30 PM EST

OC pathologist cites police fight for man's death

The Associated Press

Kelly Thomas died, in part, because of lack of oxygen to his brain during a violent struggle with police, an Orange County pathologist testified Thursday during the trial of two former Fullerton officers charged with killing the homeless man.

"The chest got compressed, that caused (Thomas) not to breathe," Aruna Singhania told jurors during the fourth day of trial.

Former officer Manuel Ramos, 39, has pleaded not guilty to second-degree murder and involuntary manslaughter and Jay Cicinelli, 41, has pleaded not guilty to involuntary manslaughter and use of excessive force.


Thomas, 37, had a history of drug use, citations for minor crimes and violent behavior. The officers' attorneys argued that he became violently combative after he was stopped and questioned July 5. He stopped breathing and was removed from life support five days later.

Much of the incident was captured by a security camera and audio recordings from officers' body microphones that promise to be the centerpiece of the trial.


Singhania, a pathologist who performed the autopsy on Thomas, said his death was caused by bronchial pneumonia and by lack of oxygen to his brain "due to mechanical chest compression with blunt cranial injuries sustained during physical altercation with a law enforcement officer."

She also detailed the facial injuries he received, including a broken nose and hemorrhaged left eye.

For the first time, the Orange County Superior Court jurors also saw images of Thomas in the hospital, his face bruised and his beard matted with blood.

Defense lawyers have argued that Thomas's death as linked to heart disease caused, in part, by methamphetamine use.

In his opening statement Monday, John Barnett, Ramos' attorney, told jurors that Thomas had been taking methamphetamines since the 10th grade that caused him to have spontaneous, violent outbursts.

"Kelly Thomas died of cardiac arrest from overexerting an already diseased heart," Michael Schwartz, Cicinelli's lawyer, said in his opening statement. "He was in a struggle and fight that lasted five full minutes or more, and his heart couldn't take it."

Singhania said she found that Thomas had heart disease but that didn't kill him.

"He died with an enlarged heart," she testified. "He did not die of an enlarged heart."