During a recent review of the Ellen Greenberg case, Philadelphia Chief Medical Examiner Lindsay Simon discovered 20 additional bruises and three additional \u201cperforations in the skin\u201d never before documented on Greenberg\u2019s body, raising the total number of bruises to 31 and stab wounds to 23, up from 20. <\/p>\n
Despite that new information, Simon concluded Greenberg\u2019s death \u201cis best classified as \u2018Suicide,\u2019\u201d as it has been by the city since it was switched from homicide in 2011. <\/p>\n
In a 32-page report detailing her findings, Simon based her determination on several factors, including Greenberg\u2019s anxiety about her work as a first-grade teacher and how grades \u201cshe needed to submit on the day of her death would indicate that she had previously given inflated grades to her students.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWhile her recent change in medications had helped with the insomnia associated with her anxiety, she did not survive long enough to address the anxiety itself,\u201d Simon wrote. \u201cThus, she had an increase in energy to act on her anxious thoughts.\u201d<\/p>\n
The court-ordered reexamination was part of an agreement that Greenberg\u2019s parents, Joshua and Sandra, reached with the city in February to settle two lawsuits they brought against Philadelphia authorities relating to the investigations into their daughter\u2019s death. <\/p>\n
Simon\u2019s review was delivered to the Greenberg\u2019 attorney, Joseph Podraza Jr., Friday afternoon, in advance of a court hearing Tuesday<\/a> to address a motion he filed to compel the city to produce its findings. <\/p>\n The Greenbergs, who haven\u2019t been able to stomach reading the review but are aware of its suicide conclusion, were disappointed but not surprised.<\/p>\n \u201cThe whole thing was bogus,\u201d Joshua Greenberg said. \u201cI expected the city to do this. Her synopsis doesn\u2019t change a darn thing. Philadelphia will do everything they can to prove their point.\u201d<\/p>\n Podraza wasn\u2019t shocked by the determination either. <\/p>\n \u201cThat didn\u2019t surprise me as much as when I turned to reading the substance of this alleged report,\u201d he said. \u201cOverall, I think it\u2019s a product that\u2019s disingenuous and really constitutes tripe.\u201d<\/p>\n Differing opinions<\/p>\n The suicide determination reached by Simon, who was not previously involved in the investigations into Greenberg\u2019s case, flies in the face of a January statement signed by Marlon Osbourne, the pathologist who conducted Greenberg\u2019s autopsy in 2011. <\/p>\n In that sworn statement<\/a>, Osbourne \u2014 who initially ruled Greenberg\u2019s death a homicide, before later switching it to suicide \u2014 said he now believes her death \u201cshould be designated as something other than suicide.\u201d<\/p>\n The remaining options are homicide or undetermined. Simon did not address Osbourne\u2019s new position in her review and it is unclear if it factored into her decision. <\/p>\n Simon\u2019s determination also goes against five of the seven consultative reports from forensic experts she considered as part of her review, who concluded that the case is indicative of homicide or \u201cnot biomechanically consistent with suicide.\u201d <\/p>\n A sixth report from a blood splatter expert made no determination on the manner of Greenberg\u2019s death, but concluded her body had been moved. All of those reports were retained by the Greenbergs while the seventh report, which supported suicide, was produced by an expert for the city. <\/p>\n From homicide to suicide<\/p>\n Greenberg, 27, was found by her fianc\u00e9, Samuel Goldberg, in the kitchen of their Venice Lofts apartment in Manayunk with a 10-inch knife lodged four inches into her chest on Jan. 26, 2011.<\/p>\n Investigators on scene treated her death as a suicide because Goldberg told them the swing bar lock to their apartment was engaged from the inside and he had to break it down to get in. There were no signs of an intruder and Greenberg had no defensive wounds, police have said<\/a>.<\/p>\n But the next morning at her autopsy, Osbourne noted a total of 20 stab wounds to Greenberg\u2019s body, including 10 to the back of her neck, along with 11 bruises in various stages of healing, and ruled her death a homicide.<\/p>\n By the time homicide investigators returned to the scene to conduct their investigation, the apartment was already professionally cleaned and electronic devices belonging to Greenberg had been removed by a member of Goldberg\u2019s family.<\/p>\n Shortly after the homicide ruling, police began publicly disputing the findings from the Medical Examiner\u2019s Office and Osbourne later changed his ruling to suicide, with no explanation to the family. The Greenbergs subsequently retained numerous independent forensic experts who have questioned authorities\u2019 findings, as first detailed in a March 2019 Inquirer report<\/a>.<\/p>\n The lawsuits<\/p>\n The Greenbergs and Podraza filed their first civil suit against the city in 2019, seeking to have the manner of Greenberg\u2019s death changed from suicide back to homicide or undetermined. Their second suit, which was filed in 2022 and resulted from new information obtained through discovery and depositions<\/a> in the first suit, alleged the investigation into Greenberg\u2019s death was \u201cembarrassingly botched\u201d and resulted in a \u201ccover-up\u201d by Philadelphia authorities. <\/p>\n