Overview

• Judge Linda Carpenter criticized the city for failing to finish a court-ordered reexamination of Ellen Greenberg’s 2011 death and set an Oct. 14 deadline to deliver results.
• She questioned why the death certificate, reported as listing homicide, could not be changed to undetermined and raised the prospect of restoring the case to the trial list if the settlement was breached.
• City attorney Michael Pestrak said the medical examiner’s review has been underway since April and was slowed by an understaffed office during an AFSCME District Council 33 strike.
• As part of a settlement with Greenberg’s parents, the city agreed to an expeditious review by the medical examiner’s office, which the family sought after years of disputing the suicide ruling.
• Background in dispute includes roughly 20 stab wounds, an initial homicide designation later changed to suicide, independent experts finding at least one postmortem wound, and the autopsy pathologist’s recent recanting of the suicide classification.