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8299: Doctor performs second autopsy on preacher's remains (fwd)
From: leonie hermantin <lhermantin@hotmail.com>
Doctor performs second autopsy on preacher's remains
By Ellis Berger
Miami Bureau
Posted June 9 2001
MIAMI · An independent pathologist -- hired by the high-profile Stuart law
firm of Willie Gary -- performed a second autopsy Friday on the remains of
Marc Dorvil, the part-time Baptist preacher who died last month while in the
custody of North Bay Village police.
Dr. Ronald Reeves of Ormand Beach performed the autopsy in the morgue of the
Miami-Dade County Medical Examiner's Office, where Dorvil's remains have
been kept since he died May 14, bound hand and foot in the back seat of a
police cruiser.
Office spokesman Larry Cameron said Reeves likely would be reviewing the
original findings as well as performing his own examination and tests of the
body and specimens that have been preserved.
Dorvil's widow, Sylvanie, surprised lawyers at the Miami firm of Stabinski &
Funt this week when she notified them that she had been encouraged to hire
Gary to represent her in a potential wrongful death suit.
"I have no idea what happened," said Luis Stabinski, "We had been talking to
the client, and then she told us on Thursday that somebody drove her to
Stuart."
The unusual circumstances surrounding Dorvil's death, and the subsequent
announcement by State Attorney Katherine Fernandez Rundle that she was
closing her investigation because there was no evidence that police officers
had committed a crime, triggered an hours-long protest a week ago that
temporarily shut down the 79th Street Causeway.
The initial autopsy concluded that Dorvil's behavior and death were the
result of a rare brain condition described as acute exhaustive mania, which
is caused by faulty chemicals in the brain. Some community activists insist
the condition would not have been fatal if not exacerbated by police
mistreatment.
According to Rundle's office, Dorvil was driving west on the causeway at
about five miles an hour when he bumped into the wall of the
Benihanarestaurant near North Bay Village's police station. Dorvil, 48,
ended up in a confrontation with eight of the village's police officers.
After a struggle in which he reportedly bit some of the officers, he was
bound with flex cuffs -- community activists say he was hog-tied -- and
placed in the police vehicle.
Paramedics called to the scene to treat the officers say they were not told
Dorvil also needed medical attention, even though the police later said they
were taking him to Jackson Memorial Hospital.
Islande Solomon of the group Haitian Women of Miami, which has been
assisting the family, said Sylvanie Dorvil "wanted somebody with expertise
in these kinds of suits. She believes Willie Gary can handle the litigation
in a way that will ensure a future for her and her children."
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