Just in case you were sitting on the edge of your seat, avidly awaiting news about the so-called LSD overdose... well, relax.
Humboldt County Coroner Frank Jäger announced Thursday that Martin Frederick Cotton II died from a subdural hematoma, or collection of blood on the surface of his brain, the result of blunt force trauma to his head.
Cotton, 26, died Aug. 9 after less than two hours at the Humboldt County jail following a series of fights, including one with officers from the Eureka Police Department.
An autopsy Aug. 13 revealed evidence of blunt force trauma, but stopped short of determining his cause of death.
Of course, they're still going to list "potentially toxic levels" of LSD as a contributing factor in his death, but it seems clear that whole diagnosis was silly from the outset. Granted, when you stop to think about Cotton's behavior, it's not unreasonable to imagine that LSD might have contributed in some fashion. This, for instance, never particularly sounded like rational behavior:
A surveillance video from inside the jail reportedly shows movements by Cotton inside his cell that suggest he might have repeatedly banged his head against a wall.
The video has not been made public, but Jäger said the pathologists watched it and were unable to draw any firm conclusions from it.
Maybe that's due to the fact that, according to an earlier report:
Humboldt County Sheriff Gary Philp said the sobering cell that held Cotton was equipped with padded floors, walls and dividers, making the report that Cotton died from injuries sustained while banging his head against the cell floor seem improbable.
In the end, the actual manner of death could not be concluded - the investigators couldn't make up their minds if this was a case of "natural death, homicide, suicide, [or] accident." Seems weird to me that someone could wind up in police custody and yet nobody could pin down how he died... oh wait, that doesn't actually seem weird at all. The moral of the story: stay off the drugs, kids! High doses of LSD have been associated with subdural hematomas! It's not safe!
