Trey Reed: Family Says Ben Crump Never Sent Autopsy Results 

It’s been nearly a year since Trey Reed was found hanging in a tree on the campus of Mississippi’s Delta State University. While attorney Ben Crump was a notable advocate for Reed’s family in the early days of the investigation, the family now says he hasn’t responded to them for months and never sent the results of an independent investigation. 

According to the Mississippi Free Press, a group of Delta State football players found Reed hanging in a tree on Sept. 15 of last year. Reed’s death immediately brought to mind Mississippi’s legacy of lynchings and the pervasive racism that still plagues the state. Officials ruled that Reed’s death was a suicide, a finding that Reed’s family pushed back against. 

Crump came to the family’s aid only days after Reed’s body was found and was one of the first to cast doubt on the state’s findings. With assistance from Colin Kaepernick’s Know Your Rights organization, Crump helped Reed’s family obtain an independent autopsy. 

“Trey’s death evoked the collective memory of a community that has suffered a historic wound over many, many years and many, many deaths,” Crump said in a statement last year. “Peace will come only by getting to the truth. We thank Colin Kaepernick for supporting this grieving family and the cause of justice and truth.”

While Crump helped bring national attention to the case in its early days, Reed’s family says that he has not responded to them in nearly seven months. “ I’ve been calling, calling, calling Ben Crump. … I haven’t heard anything from him since he said that he would get back in touch with me between Christmas and the first of the year,” Trey’s mother, Sophia Reed, told the Mississippi Free Press in an interview in April. “They would not answer the phone for anybody.”

“ We’re just trying to figure it out. We just want to know what really happened,” Trey’s grandmother, Sharon Candy Tillman, told the Mississippi Free Press. 

The family says they had issues with how Crump handled their case early on. He assigned a Mississippi liaison to the family, and they say getting in contact with Crump was often difficult. 

“Conversations and trying to get information was very hard. He would either not text back or not call us back, and we would have to call four, five, six, seven, 10 times for him to call back,” Shonna Tillman told the news outlet. “He would promise us an answer one week, and a week would go by, and we still wouldn’t have an answer. So we’re back playing chase the lawyer again.”

The last time they heard from Crump was January of this year, before, in their words, he moved on to another high-profile case. The family spoke to Dr. Matthias Okoye, an independent forensic pathologist, about his initial autopsy findings last October. The family says they never received the final findings of the independent autopsy and haven’t spoken to Okoye since their first conversation.  

If what they’re saying is accurate, it’s understandable why the family feels discarded. Crump is currently representing the families of Kohen Wiley, an infant who was killed in a police shooting, and Nolan Wells, another young Black man whose death is shrouded in mystery. Both of those cases happened in Mississippi as well, which likely doesn’t make the family feel better about Crump’s apparent ghosting. 

“It’s been extremely difficult, and it also feels like we got pushed to the side once another big case came, and that is really unfortunate,” Shonna told the Mississippi Free Press. “We just want the truth, whatever that looks like. And we’re not trying to cause any trouble or division. We just want answers so we can properly grieve as a family.”

NewsOne has reached out to Ben Crump and the Know Your Rights organization for comment, and we will update this story if and when they respond. 

SEE ALSO:

Trey Reed: Video Evidence Is Being Reviewed In Black Student’s Hanging

Trey Reed: State Medical Examiner Rules Hanging Death A Suicide

Colin Kaepernick Funds Independent Autopsy For Trey Reed

Trey Reed’s Death Should Not Be A Rumor-Filled Spectacle

Black Student Found Hanging At Mississippi’s Delta State University

Trey Reed: Family Says Ben Crump Never Sent Autopsy Results was originally published on newsone.com