Overview
- Smith was found unresponsive after delivering pizzas and died at age 36, a death that occurred on Saturday, June 13, and prompted an immediate Santa Clara County medical examiner inquiry.
- The family has retained attorneys Harry Daniels, Bakari Sellers and Wayne Kendall and has donated and sent Smith’s brain to Boston University’s CTE Center for neuropathological study.
- Boston University will examine the tissue for chronic traumatic encephalopathy and other damage from concussions, but such testing can only confirm CTE after post-mortem analysis and does not by itself determine cause of death.
- The Santa Clara County chief medical examiner has not released a cause or manner of death and toxicology and autopsy results remain pending, a process that can take weeks or months.
- Smith’s high-profile career and the family’s assertion of numerous past concussions frame the inquiry, and the family’s move could inform research and public discussion about long-term effects of repeated head impacts in football.