Defense cross-examines cardiologist who said Manuel Ellis died due to police restraints
Lawyers for the Tacoma police officers on trial for the death of Manuel Ellis questioned prosecutors’ expert cardiologist Thursday morning about his opinion on Ellis’ cause of death and opinions he previously offered in a California in-custody death case.
Under cross-examination, Dr. Daniel Wohlgelernter, a cardiologist from Stana Monica, California, answered questions about the similarities and differences between Ellis’ death in police custody and that of Humberto Martinez, who, according to CBS News, died in 2016 in Pittsburg, California, after encountering police.
Wohlgelernter testified Wednesday that his opinion is police officers’ restraint of Ellis didn’t give his body room to breathe, causing him to asphyxiate, go into cardiac arrest and die.
His testimony Thursday showed that years ago he was also retained by an attorney representing Martinez’s family to offer an opinion on cause of death, and he similarly concluded that it was police’s restraint that caused compressive asphyxia, which led to Martinez’s organs not getting enough oxygen, causing pulseless electrical activity.
The cardiologist said pulseless electrical activity, meaning the activity of the heart is too weak to sustain a pulse, is “classic” for hypoxia-induced cardiac arrest, rather than cardiac arrest caused by methamphetamine or an underlying heart condition.
Mark Conrad, an attorney for officer Timothy Rankine, pointed out Wednesday that wording in certain parts of Wohlgelernter’s report on Martinez’s cause of death was the same wording he used in his report on Ellis’ cause of death. Other defense attorneys continued on the topic Thursday, drawing jurors’ attention to the fact that Martinez was more severely beaten and restrained by police than Ellis, but Wohlgelernter came to the same conclusion on cause of death.
Wohlgelernter testified that his opinion on the men’s causes of death were the same, but he believed their injuries were different.
On prosecutors’ redirect examination, the cardiologist explained that the condition of pulseless electrical activity is not unique to an individual, and his wording in the two reports was the same because he’s describing the same process.
Ellis, 33, died of hypoxia, a form of oxygen deprivation, the night of March 3, 2020, due to physical restraint, the Pierce County medical examiner found. His death was ruled a homicide. Four eyewitnesses have testified that police instigated the deadly interaction, and that Ellis did not fight back as he was repeatedly struck, shocked with a Taser and pressed to the ground. Expert testimony has shown that the man told police he couldn’t breathe multiple times while officers continued to apply force.
Officers Christopher Burbank, Matthew Collins and Rankine are charged with first-degree manslaughter for killing Ellis. Collins and Burbank also face charges of second-degree murder. The defendants have pleaded not guilty, are free on bail and remain on paid leave from the Tacoma Police Department.
Lawyers for the officers have argued that police had to subdue Ellis because he was aggressive and resisted arrest, and they have pointed to the man’s underlying health conditions and methamphetamine intoxication as another explanation for his death. Collins and Burbank told detectives they saw Ellis try the door of a car passing through an intersection, and when they called him over to their patrol car, he began punching their windows. Collins reported that when he got out, Ellis fought him with “superhuman strength.”
Thursday’s cross-examination also focused Wohlgelernter’s answers regarding Ellis’ heart rate and the fact that while he was hooked up to a heart monitor, he did at one point exhibit ventricular tachycardia, an abnormal, fast heart rhythm which would be more consistent with meth overdose.
Wohlgelernter said Ellis exhibited this condition after paramedics administered epinephrine, a medication that he said is a “very powerful” stimulant that is appropriate to use when trying to save someone’s life, but which can irritate the heart and trigger ventricular tachycardia.
The cardiologist’s testimony concluded before court broke for lunch, and he was excused.
This story was originally published October 26, 2023 at 12:27 PM.
