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Prosecutor: Bland’s Autopsy Revealed No Evidence of Homicide

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The Waller County jail cell where Sandra Bland was found dead is seen Wednesday, July 22, 2015, in Hempstead, Texas.  Bland was arrested and taken to the jail about 60 miles (100 kilometers) northwest of Houston on July 10 and found dead July 13. Officials say Bland hanged herself with a plastic garbage bag in her jail cell, a contention her family and supporters dispute. (AP Photo/Pat Sullivan)

The Waller County jail cell where Sandra Bland was found dead is seen Wednesday, July 22, 2015, in Hempstead, Texas. Bland was arrested and taken to the jail about 60 miles (100 kilometers) northwest of Houston on July 10 and found dead July 13. Officials say Bland hanged herself with a plastic garbage bag in her jail cell, a contention her family and supporters dispute. (AP Photo/Pat Sullivan)

MICHAEL GRACZYK, Associated Press
JASON KEYSER, Associated Press

HEMPSTEAD, Texas (AP) — The autopsy of a black woman who was found dead in a Texas jail revealed no injuries that would suggest she was killed by someone else, authorities said Thursday.

Waller County prosecutor Warren Diepraam said the autopsy showed that 28-year-old Sandra Bland had no defensive injuries on her hands that would typically indicate a struggle.

Some lacerations or abrasions were found on her wrists. Those were consistent with a struggle while being handcuffed. The marks around Bland’s neck were consistent with a suicide by hanging, Diepraam said.

Bland also had about 30 small cuts on her wrist that were probably self-inflicted within the last few weeks, he added.

She was arrested in a traffic stop three days before she was found in her cell on July 13. Her family and friends dispute the official finding that she killed herself using a noose fashioned from a plastic garbage bag.

Texas Rangers and the FBI are investigating.

Also Thursday, the woman’s sister confirmed that Bland had taken prescription medication for seizures in the past.

Booking documents filled out for Bland after her arrest indicate she told staff at the jail that she had epilepsy and was taking medication for it. The forms identify the drug as Keppra.

Other forms, however, say she was not taking medication.

Company information on Keppra, which is sold in regular and extended-release forms, says that “antiepileptic drugs, including Keppra and Keppra XR, may cause suicidal thoughts or actions in a very small number of people, about 1 in 500.”

Sharon Cooper told The Associated Press that her sister suffered from seizures about a decade ago but had not had any in recent years and was not on medication.

The medication was not the only inconsistency in the jail-intake papers. One questionnaire said Bland took pills in 2015 in an attempt to kill herself after losing a baby. A separate form filled out by another jail employee said the suicide attempt occurred in 2014.

Cooper said her sister had a miscarriage in May 2014, but got through it. Cooper also said she was not aware of any suicide attempt.

Asked if her sister could have been getting treatment without relatives knowing, Cooper said the family’s five sisters were “above board” with each other and, if anything, “overshared.”

“If it was happening, I would have known,” she said.

Preliminary results of an independent autopsy arranged by the family showed bruising to deep muscle tissue in Bland’s back, consistent with the officer having his knee there, Cooper said.

She would not say if there were other findings. Full results won’t be in for a couple of weeks.

A woman who occupied a jail cell next to Bland said the Chicago-area woman was emotional and wept often during her three days in jail.

Alexandria Pyle told Houston television station KTRK that Bland was “sort of distraught” that a friend had not come to bail her out of jail. She said Bland told her she “was not equipped” for incarceration and thought she was the victim of an injustice.

Pyle said she heard no signs of a struggle in the cell.

Preliminary results of the Texas autopsy also showed that Bland had marijuana in her system. The drug-test results are worth noting because they could be “relevant to her state of mind,” Diepraam said.

Authorities said any contradictions in the jail documents were the result of Bland’s inconsistent answers to jailers’ questions.

Bland’s death comes after nearly a year of heightened national scrutiny of police and their dealings with black suspects, especially those who have been killed by officers or die in police custody. It has resonated on social media, with posts questioning the official account and featuring the hashtags #JusticeForSandy and #WhatHappenedToSandyBland.

Bland’s family has said she was not despondent and was looking forward to starting a new job at her alma mater, Prairie View A&M University.

However, Bland posted a video to her Facebook page in March, saying she was suffering from “a little bit of depression as well as PTSD,” or post-traumatic stress disorder.

Cooper said that “everyone has peaks and valleys” and that the Facebook video might indicate her sister was just having a bad day or a bad few days.

A video of her arrest taken from the officer’s dashcam shows state trooper Brian Encinia drawing a stun gun and threatening Bland when she refuses to follow his orders.

The episode began when the trooper stopped Bland for failing to signal a lane change.

The conversation turned hostile after the officer asked Bland to put out her cigarette and she asked why she can’t smoke in her own car. The trooper then ordered Bland to get out of the vehicle. She refused, and he told her she was under arrest.

The roadside encounter swiftly escalated into a shouting confrontation, with the officer threatening to drag her out of the car. At one point, he warned Bland, “I will light you up.”

The trooper, who has been on the force for just over a year, has been placed on administrative leave for violating unspecified police procedures and the department’s courtesy policy.

___

Keyser reported from Chicago.

___

Dashcam video posted by Texas Department of Public Safety: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CaW09Ymr2BA.

Copyright 2015 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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Oakland Post: Week of April 8 – 14, 2026

The printed Weekly Edition of the Oakland Post: Week of April 8 – 14, 2026

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Oakland Post: Week of April 1 – 7, 2026

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Black Artists in America, Installation Three Wraps at the Dixon Gallery and Gardens

TRI-STATE DEFENDER — With 50+ paintings, sculptures and assemblages, the exhibit features artists like Varnette Honeywood from Los Angeles, whose pieces appeared in Bill Coby’s private collection (before they were auctioned off) and on “The Cosby Show.” Also included are works by Alonzo Davis, another Los Angeles artist who opened one of the first galleries there where Black Artists could exhibit. 

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By Candace A. Gray | Tri-State Defender

The tulips gleefully greet those who enter the gates at the Dixon Gallery & Gardens on an almost spring day. More than 650,000 bulbs of various hues are currently on display. And they are truly breathtaking.

Inside the gallery, and equally as breathtaking, is the “Black Artists in America, From the Bicentennial to September 11” exhibit, which runs through Sunday, March 29. This is the third installment of a three-part series that started years ago and illustrates part of the Black experience through visual arts in the 20th century.

“This story picks up where part two left off,’’ said Kevin Sharp, the Linda W. and S. Herbert Rhea director for the Dixon. “This era is when we really start to see the emergence of these important Black artists’ agency and freedom shine through. They start to say and express what they want to, and it was a really beautiful time.”

With 50+ paintings, sculptures and assemblages, the exhibit features artists like Varnette Honeywood from Los Angeles, whose pieces appeared in Bill Coby’s private collection (before they were auctioned off) and on “The Cosby Show.” Also included are works by Alonzo Davis, another Los Angeles artist who opened one of the first galleries there where Black Artists could exhibit.

“Though [Davis] was from LA, he actually lived in Memphis for a decade,” said Sharp. “He was a dean at Memphis College of Art, and later opened the first gallery in New York owned and operated by black curators.”

Another featured artist is former NFL player, Ernie Barnes. His work is distinctive. Where have you seen one of his most popular paintings, Sugar Shack? On the end scene and credits of the hit show “Good Times.” His piece Saturday Night, Durham, North Carolina, 1974 is in this collection.

Memphis native James Little’s “The War Baby: The Triptych” is among more than 50 works featured in “Black Artists in America, From the Bicentennial to September 11” at the Dixon Gallery & Gardens, the final installment of a three-part series highlighting the impact and evolution of Black artists through 2011.

Memphis native James Little’s “The War Baby: The Triptych” is among more than 50 works featured in “Black Artists in America, From the Bicentennial to September 11” at the Dixon Gallery & Gardens, the final installment of a three-part series highlighting the impact and evolution of Black artists through 2011.

The exhibit features other artists with Memphis ties, including abstract painter James Little, who was raised in a segregated Memphis and attended Memphis Academy of Art (before it was Memphis College of Art). He later moved to New York, became a teacher and an internationally acclaimed fixture in the art world in 2022 when he was named a Whitney Biennial selected artist at the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York.

Other artists like Romare Bearden, who had a Southern experience but lived up North, were featured in all three installments.

“During this period of time, he was a major figure,” said Sharp. “He wrote one of the first books on the history of African American art during a time when there were more Black academics, art teachers, more Black everything!”

Speaking of Black educators, Sharp said the head curator behind this tri-part series and Dixon’s partner in the arts is Earnestine Jenkins, Ph.D., an art history professor at the University of Memphis, who also earned a Master of Arts degree from Memphis State University (now UofM).  “We began working with Dr. Jenkins in 2018,” he said.

Sharp explained that it takes a team of curators, registrars, counterparts at other museums, and more, about three years to assemble an exhibit like this. It came together quite seamlessly, he added. Each room conjured up more jaw-dropping “wows” than the one before it. Each piece worked with the others to tell the story of Black people and their collective experience during this time period.

One of the last artists about whom Sharp shared information was Bettye Saar, who will turn 100 years old this year. She’s been working in Los Angeles for 80 years and is finally getting her due. Her medium is collages or assemblages, and an incredible work of hers is on display. She’s married to an artist and has two daughters, also artists.

The exhibit catalogue bears some of these artists’ stories, among other scholarly information.

The exhibit, presented by the Joe Orgill Family Fund for Exhibitions, is culturally and colorfully rich. It is a must see and admission to the Dixon is free.

Visit https://www.dixon.org/ to learn more.

Fun Facts: An original James Little design lives in the flooring of the basketball court at Tom Lee Park, and he makes and mixes his own paint colors.

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Prosecutor: Bland’s Autopsy Revealed No Evidence of Homicide

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The Waller County jail cell where Sandra Bland was found dead is seen Wednesday, July 22, 2015, in Hempstead, Texas.  Bland was arrested and taken to the jail about 60 miles (100 kilometers) northwest of Houston on July 10 and found dead July 13. Officials say Bland hanged herself with a plastic garbage bag in her jail cell, a contention her family and supporters dispute. (AP Photo/Pat Sullivan)

The Waller County jail cell where Sandra Bland was found dead is seen Wednesday, July 22, 2015, in Hempstead, Texas. Bland was arrested and taken to the jail about 60 miles (100 kilometers) northwest of Houston on July 10 and found dead July 13. Officials say Bland hanged herself with a plastic garbage bag in her jail cell, a contention her family and supporters dispute. (AP Photo/Pat Sullivan)

MICHAEL GRACZYK, Associated Press
JASON KEYSER, Associated Press

HEMPSTEAD, Texas (AP) — The autopsy of a black woman who was found dead in a Texas jail revealed no injuries that would suggest she was killed by someone else, authorities said Thursday.

Waller County prosecutor Warren Diepraam said the autopsy showed that 28-year-old Sandra Bland had no defensive injuries on her hands that would typically indicate a struggle.

Some lacerations or abrasions were found on her wrists. Those were consistent with a struggle while being handcuffed. The marks around Bland’s neck were consistent with a suicide by hanging, Diepraam said.

Bland also had about 30 small cuts on her wrist that were probably self-inflicted within the last few weeks, he added.

She was arrested in a traffic stop three days before she was found in her cell on July 13. Her family and friends dispute the official finding that she killed herself using a noose fashioned from a plastic garbage bag.

Texas Rangers and the FBI are investigating.

Also Thursday, the woman’s sister confirmed that Bland had taken prescription medication for seizures in the past.

Booking documents filled out for Bland after her arrest indicate she told staff at the jail that she had epilepsy and was taking medication for it. The forms identify the drug as Keppra.

Other forms, however, say she was not taking medication.

Company information on Keppra, which is sold in regular and extended-release forms, says that “antiepileptic drugs, including Keppra and Keppra XR, may cause suicidal thoughts or actions in a very small number of people, about 1 in 500.”

Sharon Cooper told The Associated Press that her sister suffered from seizures about a decade ago but had not had any in recent years and was not on medication.

The medication was not the only inconsistency in the jail-intake papers. One questionnaire said Bland took pills in 2015 in an attempt to kill herself after losing a baby. A separate form filled out by another jail employee said the suicide attempt occurred in 2014.

Cooper said her sister had a miscarriage in May 2014, but got through it. Cooper also said she was not aware of any suicide attempt.

Asked if her sister could have been getting treatment without relatives knowing, Cooper said the family’s five sisters were “above board” with each other and, if anything, “overshared.”

“If it was happening, I would have known,” she said.

Preliminary results of an independent autopsy arranged by the family showed bruising to deep muscle tissue in Bland’s back, consistent with the officer having his knee there, Cooper said.

She would not say if there were other findings. Full results won’t be in for a couple of weeks.

A woman who occupied a jail cell next to Bland said the Chicago-area woman was emotional and wept often during her three days in jail.

Alexandria Pyle told Houston television station KTRK that Bland was “sort of distraught” that a friend had not come to bail her out of jail. She said Bland told her she “was not equipped” for incarceration and thought she was the victim of an injustice.

Pyle said she heard no signs of a struggle in the cell.

Preliminary results of the Texas autopsy also showed that Bland had marijuana in her system. The drug-test results are worth noting because they could be “relevant to her state of mind,” Diepraam said.

Authorities said any contradictions in the jail documents were the result of Bland’s inconsistent answers to jailers’ questions.

Bland’s death comes after nearly a year of heightened national scrutiny of police and their dealings with black suspects, especially those who have been killed by officers or die in police custody. It has resonated on social media, with posts questioning the official account and featuring the hashtags #JusticeForSandy and #WhatHappenedToSandyBland.

Bland’s family has said she was not despondent and was looking forward to starting a new job at her alma mater, Prairie View A&M University.

However, Bland posted a video to her Facebook page in March, saying she was suffering from “a little bit of depression as well as PTSD,” or post-traumatic stress disorder.

Cooper said that “everyone has peaks and valleys” and that the Facebook video might indicate her sister was just having a bad day or a bad few days.

A video of her arrest taken from the officer’s dashcam shows state trooper Brian Encinia drawing a stun gun and threatening Bland when she refuses to follow his orders.

The episode began when the trooper stopped Bland for failing to signal a lane change.

The conversation turned hostile after the officer asked Bland to put out her cigarette and she asked why she can’t smoke in her own car. The trooper then ordered Bland to get out of the vehicle. She refused, and he told her she was under arrest.

The roadside encounter swiftly escalated into a shouting confrontation, with the officer threatening to drag her out of the car. At one point, he warned Bland, “I will light you up.”

The trooper, who has been on the force for just over a year, has been placed on administrative leave for violating unspecified police procedures and the department’s courtesy policy.

___

Keyser reported from Chicago.

___

Dashcam video posted by Texas Department of Public Safety: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CaW09Ymr2BA.

Copyright 2015 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Activism

Oakland Post: Week of April 8 – 14, 2026

The printed Weekly Edition of the Oakland Post: Week of April 8 – 14, 2026

Published

on

To enlarge your view of this issue, use the slider, magnifying glass icon or full page icon in the lower right corner of the browser window.

Continue Reading

Activism

Oakland Post: Week of April 1 – 7, 2026

The printed Weekly Edition of the Oakland Post: Week of April 1 – 7, 2026

Published

on

To enlarge your view of this issue, use the slider, magnifying glass icon or full page icon in the lower right corner of the browser window.

Continue Reading

#NNPA BlackPress

Black Artists in America, Installation Three Wraps at the Dixon Gallery and Gardens

TRI-STATE DEFENDER — With 50+ paintings, sculptures and assemblages, the exhibit features artists like Varnette Honeywood from Los Angeles, whose pieces appeared in Bill Coby’s private collection (before they were auctioned off) and on “The Cosby Show.” Also included are works by Alonzo Davis, another Los Angeles artist who opened one of the first galleries there where Black Artists could exhibit. 

Published

on

By

By Candace A. Gray | Tri-State Defender

The tulips gleefully greet those who enter the gates at the Dixon Gallery & Gardens on an almost spring day. More than 650,000 bulbs of various hues are currently on display. And they are truly breathtaking.

Inside the gallery, and equally as breathtaking, is the “Black Artists in America, From the Bicentennial to September 11” exhibit, which runs through Sunday, March 29. This is the third installment of a three-part series that started years ago and illustrates part of the Black experience through visual arts in the 20th century.

“This story picks up where part two left off,’’ said Kevin Sharp, the Linda W. and S. Herbert Rhea director for the Dixon. “This era is when we really start to see the emergence of these important Black artists’ agency and freedom shine through. They start to say and express what they want to, and it was a really beautiful time.”

With 50+ paintings, sculptures and assemblages, the exhibit features artists like Varnette Honeywood from Los Angeles, whose pieces appeared in Bill Coby’s private collection (before they were auctioned off) and on “The Cosby Show.” Also included are works by Alonzo Davis, another Los Angeles artist who opened one of the first galleries there where Black Artists could exhibit.

“Though [Davis] was from LA, he actually lived in Memphis for a decade,” said Sharp. “He was a dean at Memphis College of Art, and later opened the first gallery in New York owned and operated by black curators.”

Another featured artist is former NFL player, Ernie Barnes. His work is distinctive. Where have you seen one of his most popular paintings, Sugar Shack? On the end scene and credits of the hit show “Good Times.” His piece Saturday Night, Durham, North Carolina, 1974 is in this collection.

Memphis native James Little’s “The War Baby: The Triptych” is among more than 50 works featured in “Black Artists in America, From the Bicentennial to September 11” at the Dixon Gallery & Gardens, the final installment of a three-part series highlighting the impact and evolution of Black artists through 2011.

Memphis native James Little’s “The War Baby: The Triptych” is among more than 50 works featured in “Black Artists in America, From the Bicentennial to September 11” at the Dixon Gallery & Gardens, the final installment of a three-part series highlighting the impact and evolution of Black artists through 2011.

The exhibit features other artists with Memphis ties, including abstract painter James Little, who was raised in a segregated Memphis and attended Memphis Academy of Art (before it was Memphis College of Art). He later moved to New York, became a teacher and an internationally acclaimed fixture in the art world in 2022 when he was named a Whitney Biennial selected artist at the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York.

Other artists like Romare Bearden, who had a Southern experience but lived up North, were featured in all three installments.

“During this period of time, he was a major figure,” said Sharp. “He wrote one of the first books on the history of African American art during a time when there were more Black academics, art teachers, more Black everything!”

Speaking of Black educators, Sharp said the head curator behind this tri-part series and Dixon’s partner in the arts is Earnestine Jenkins, Ph.D., an art history professor at the University of Memphis, who also earned a Master of Arts degree from Memphis State University (now UofM).  “We began working with Dr. Jenkins in 2018,” he said.

Sharp explained that it takes a team of curators, registrars, counterparts at other museums, and more, about three years to assemble an exhibit like this. It came together quite seamlessly, he added. Each room conjured up more jaw-dropping “wows” than the one before it. Each piece worked with the others to tell the story of Black people and their collective experience during this time period.

One of the last artists about whom Sharp shared information was Bettye Saar, who will turn 100 years old this year. She’s been working in Los Angeles for 80 years and is finally getting her due. Her medium is collages or assemblages, and an incredible work of hers is on display. She’s married to an artist and has two daughters, also artists.

The exhibit catalogue bears some of these artists’ stories, among other scholarly information.

The exhibit, presented by the Joe Orgill Family Fund for Exhibitions, is culturally and colorfully rich. It is a must see and admission to the Dixon is free.

Visit https://www.dixon.org/ to learn more.

Fun Facts: An original James Little design lives in the flooring of the basketball court at Tom Lee Park, and he makes and mixes his own paint colors.

Continue Reading

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