In her heart-wrenching essay for The Trace, Estela Díaz chronicles the devastating moments after her 18-year-old son, Fernando Zadkiel Vega Díaz, was shot and killed. As Zadkiel lay in his hospital bed, Díaz begged police officers for the chance to hug her son one last time. They apologized, but ultimately refused, saying Zadkiel was now “evidence” in a murder investigation. Díaz would have to say goodbye from several feet away.
Two years later, Díaz reflects on the moment, writing, “What more could they find from that embrace than the fingerprints of his mother?” Díaz’s experience raises questions about the line between the cold, hard evidentiary needs of the justice system and the closure so many family members feel they need in the wake of a sudden loss at the barrel of a gun.
The Trace spoke with eight experts in law enforcement, forensic science, medical examination, and victim services about the procedures that typically follow a gun homicide, in Illinois and elsewhere. We learned that it is indeed standard practice for police to withhold access to a victim’s body. But not being able to touch their loved one’s body can be deeply distressing for their grieving families. Those working in and close to law enforcement say their hands are tied because of the strict laws and procedures meant to protect evidence and strengthen investigations.
Díaz is hoping there’s a compromise.
The fragility of evidence
Once first responders make a pronouncement of death, a gunshot victim’s body is considered evidence in a police investigation. Chicago Police have strict guidelines for the handling of evidence meant to adhere to state laws that seek to prevent tampering and obstruction of justice. Because of these rules, only a limited number of trained personnel are supposed to interact with the body. This can include police forensic evidence technicians, crime lab workers, morgue staff, and some hospital workers.
Forensic experts emphasized the need to keep the body as undisturbed as possible because of the fragility of physical evidence. If evidence is believed to be mishandled, it could be deemed inadmissible in court. Careless handling could also lead to cross contamination or the complete loss of evidence like DNA, making it harder for prosecutors to secure a conviction.
“I completely understand why we would not want a family member under the tape on a scene. Most often, we don’t even want extra detectives and crime scene investigators because the more people that you get under that tape, the more chance we have for cross contamination,” said Maria C. Pettolina, a professor of practice for the Forensic and National Security Sciences Institute at Syracuse University. “We only have one chance to collect evidence.”
Touching the body can also create challenges for the medical examiner, who is not only responsible for collecting and documenting evidence, but also for determining the specific cause of death. Soot around bullet wounds can be easily wiped away, but it allows the medical examiner to determine the range of fire. Hospitals are often instructed not to remove things like catheters or IVs before a body is transported to the morgue, so that the medical examiner can know which changes came from medical care and which came from the crime.
“We need to be able to look at the injuries without too much manipulation,” said Dr. Ponni Arunkumar, Cook County’s Chief Medical Examiner. “It’s important for us to document everything so that the families, the courts, and law enforcement know exactly what went on with the person. Yes, the families are grieving, but we have our mission of documenting the injuries, and collecting the evidence.”
A matter of language
Hearing police describe a loved one as “evidence” is often jarring for families of gunshot victims, said Jaylynn Jones, a family support specialist with Chicago Survivors, an organization that helps crime victims. Jones said it’s common for the families she works with to feel hurt by the way police describe their loved ones after they’ve died. The language can feel barren and dehumanizing at a time when people haven’t begun processing their loss.
“Someone you love, someone you see as profound, someone who is your family now being described as evidence takes away that person’s personhood,” Jones said. “It diminishes what has taken place.”
Díaz recalls feeling angry and sad when police referred to Zadkiel as evidence. She remembers thinking, “That body was my son — a person.”
Minimizing harm
After she arrived at the morgue, Díaz felt even more disappointed. She hoped police had collected everything they needed at the hospital and that she’d finally be allowed to hold Zadkiel’s body. Instead, she was surprised to be asked to identify him through a photograph of his face on a computer screen. Digital identification, Arunkumar said, is meant to spare grieving families the trauma of having to see their loved ones in a mangled state.
“We don’t show the body because we’re not a funeral home,” Arunkumar said. “At the funeral home, they put on a lot of makeup. They make them look like how they were alive. We don’t have that capability. We don’t want that to be the last visual of them seeing that person because that can be traumatic.”
Many of the forensics and law enforcement experts we spoke with shared similar sentiments. Dr. Carrie Steiner worked as a Chicago police officer for 13 years before becoming a clinical psychologist. Steiner said she’s witnessed how families have been harmed by viewing their loved one’s body.
“They’re like, I can’t stop getting that image out of my head,” she said. “Unfortunately, homicides or any type of death is usually not pretty and that’s honestly not the way you want to remember the last time you saw the person that you love.”
Part of Díaz’s frustration, though, is that the choice was made for her. She understands that the experience might be harmful for other people, but for her, not being able to touch her son in those last moments was more traumatizing. Ten days passed before Díaz could touch Zadkiel; it was at the funeral home. By then, she felt it was too late to send him off.
“In my culture, I’m Mexican, and for us, the last moments we believe that the spirit is still in the body and they can hear you, so to touch them in that moment, let them know that you’re there, maybe they can go in peace,” Díaz said. “At the funeral, after 10 days, for me it’s just a body. My son’s body, but just a body.”
A necessary conversation
When asked what a compromise between families’ rights and evidentiary needs could look like, experts said they didn’t know — but some were hopeful that they could eventually find common ground. Wendy Gruhl, a forensic analyst who teaches at Loyola University Chicago, says she understands the need to preserve evidence, so that the criminal justice system can hopefully bring grieving families some level of comfort or peace. Still, Gruhl said, people in her field should be discussing the ways collecting evidence after a shooting might hurt survivors. She suggests convening a multidisciplinary group from across the criminal justice system to hear the “human side.”
“Get people together — people that have some power, some teeth, as opposed to just casual conversations,” Gruhl said. “We could then look at, OK, is this the balance that we want? Is this way that we’ve set up these policies skewing on the side of harming survivors?”
Pettolina said that, while she can’t envision a compromise in which families would be allowed to touch their loved one right after a shooting because it would compromise the investigation, it’s important that law enforcement immediately connect survivors with victim services that can address their needs in the long run.
The rules that keep grieving family members separated from their loved ones’ bodies exist to enable fair investigations and trials, but Díaz doesn’t think the justice system can ever bring her peace — because a conviction won’t bring Zadkiel back. She isn’t seeking revenge for his killer. Instead, she’s working to help families through their toughest moments, and hopes for a future in which investigators can collect evidence without families having to entirely forfeit those critical final moments.
“Eighteen years ago, I received that body in my arms. I was the first one to touch him. And I deserved to touch him for the last time,” Díaz said. “I think that was my right as a mom.”
