It has been over 80 days since 36-year-old Wakeisha Wilson was found dead in a Los Angeles County jail cell and 80 days of unanswered questions regarding Wilson’s suicide.
When the Sentinel last spoke to Wilson’s family attorney Jaaye Person-Lynn, he was waiting to see the video footage that shows the events that took place prior to her death. But there is a hold on the video footage and Wilson’s autopsy report.
According to the LAPD April 12, the Metropolitan Detention Center found Wilson lying on the floor unconscious and not breathing.
“The two biggest factors are that she died from strangulation and she was found on the floor. To find someone hanging from something, that makes sense that they died from strangulation but to find them lying on the floor, that does not mean she died from strangulation if it was suicide. It does make sense if it were a homicide. If it was in fact a homicide we need to know the circumstances and the perpetrator of the homicide needs to be brought to justice,” said Person-Lynn.
The release also states, the Force Investigation Division is conducting an in-depth investigation on Wilson’s death to determine if the officers complied with LAPD procedures and policies. After the Division completes their investigation they will present their findings to the Chief of Police and the Board of Police Commissioners.
After waiting over two months for the footage, Attorney Person-Lynn is concerned that by the time he receives the footage, it will be tampered with. This isn’t the first time Person-Lynn has dealt with footage that has been tampered with.
“I got one video in a case where there is a ringing sound above the whole video and the muttled conversations are very important to the case,” said Person-Lynn. “That ringing sound drowns out those conversations so now we have to spend more tax payer money to figure out how to get that ringing sound out of the audio that they gave us. Maybe
the ringing sound just happened to be in there but to me it seems like it was tampered with.”
Wilson’s family has accepted the fact that Wakeisha is gone but they still want answers to her tragic death.
“That’s why we have reached out to so many people between the DA, LAPD, Civil grand jury, the Attorney General, the Mayor’s office, City Attorney and all 15 counsel persons, that’s 21 different entities we have reached out to respond,” said Person-Lynn.
Aside from the hold on the investigation, attorney Person-Lynn has still not heard back from LAPD Chief Beck, the Attorney General refuses to look into it and the District Attorney has denied Person-Lynn access as well as the LAPD inspector general and the civil grand jury.
Wilson’s family and attorney Person-Lynn are pushing forward to set up a meeting with Curren Price, Marquise Harris Dawson and Herb Wesson’s office to get the problem resolved without resorting to litigation.
“It would be a shame that the tax payers have to pay $1,000’s of dollars to show the family the video of the death but if anyone wants to go that route, then that’s the route we have to go. If they do decide to go that route, the voters will take a real look at the city attorney and why he would waste unnecessary city resources,” said Person-Lynn. “It’s upsetting that we have a world renowned law enforcement organization that can’t seem to conduct an investigation of a homicide or a theft in their own facility. When the Asian students from USC were killed a couple of years back they put 12 of their best detectives on the case, and they tracked down the information and had suspects in custody and I don’t believe it took 80 days.”
The Sentinel reached out to LAPD but, they were unable to respond.
For more updates on the investigation of Wakeshia Wilson visit www.lasentinel.net
