Pathologist disown suicide report on Chasowa – Malawi News
Malawi’s pathologist Dr Charles Dzamalala who carried out a post-mortem on the body of a final year engineering student Robert Chasowa whose mysterious death police say was a case of suicide, has refuted ever realising any report as police were claiming.
Dzamalala told Malawi News on Saturday that he did not produce any autopsy report as earlier claimed in a police statement dated September 25, 2011. The statement reference number DIG/109/2011, was signed by police press and public Relations officer Willie Mwaluka.
“What the police are saying did not come from me. I can tell you plainly that l never released any such report,” the pathologist told Malawi News.
“A comprehensive report will be released very soon especially that l now have all results from Laboratory with me on toxicology and histology. It’s just a matter of hours or a few days’ am going to do that in the next coming days which l will deliver to the family, police and other stakeholders,” Dzamalala said.
Chasowa, who belonged to a political pressure group Youth for Democracy and Freedom (YDF), has been publishing an anti-government newsletter.
Meanwhile, police spokesman Willie Mwaluka told the paper that police were referring all queries on suicide notes and autopsy results to concerned experts so that interested parties can get information from those points.
However, according to the police statement, the post-mortem results had indicated that Chasowa died of head injuries.
And a father to Robert refuted claims made by police that he verified the note to have been written by his son.
“It is a pure lie to say that l conceded that the alleged note was authorized by my son. When the police showed me the letter l was not even carried away. I looked at it critically and told them in the face: l could not accept it,” said the dejected father.
He added: “Whenever my son wanted to communicate with me, he would call me or send me an sms, not a letter. Anyone can write that note. We have heard of people forging hand writings and signatures at banks and defraud banks. And there is no way any of my children can mistake my name with that of my late first born.
“And in our Malawian culture, there is no way my son could have addressed me using my first name. Under normal circumstances, he would have addressed me as dad or father, so the note is out of question. It cannot be treated as evidence that my son committed suicide,” he said.
Robert’s father insisted the letter was not credible.
He also questioned why the police did not adhere to his request not to do anything to the body of his son until he inspected himself.
“After l got the news that my son was found dead at the school campus, l was shocked because l could not understand how it had happened and l asked the police not to do anything to the body until l come to inspect it myself as l had to travel from Lilongwe where l stay.
“To my surprise, when l came here l found that they had done everything and what l only saw was the head since the body was already in a coffin. I was not allowed to see the whole body. As Robert’s father, I wanted to see the body of my son so that l could assess what really resulted into his death.
“I am a grown up and l am able to tell if it’s an injury resulting from a bullet or anything,” he said.
He added that though Robert’s brother saw the body at the mortuary, he could not tell what might have caused the head injuries and a cut under his chin because he said the brother is young and not experienced.
“I went to the college and they showed me where my son was found lying dead. To my surprise, there were no splashes of blood or anything like that .Even if an egg falls from your hand to the ground; you are able to see a splash of it. What more with the whole human body? There was going to be blood all over the place.”
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