Justin Carr was killed by a bullet that was never found, doctor says in murder trial
A forensic pathologist told jurors he’s confident the man killed during protests in uptown Charlotte in September 2016 was killed by a gunshot, even though the bullet has never been found.
In testimony Monday, James Lozano of the Mecklenburg County Medical Examiner’s Office said Justin Carr, 26, had entrance and exit gunshot wounds in his head.
Carr died because of the damage caused by the gunshot, Lozano testified. Prosecutors say Rayquan Borum fired the fatal bullet from a 9 mm handgun, which has also never been found. Borum’s murder trial is now in its fourth week.
Lozano told jurors that the injury seemed like it came from a handgun, but he said it wasn’t possible to determine the exact caliber from Carr’s injuries.
A 9 mm cartridge casing was found near the Omni Hotel, not far from where people protested the fatal Charlotte-Mecklenburg police shooting of Keith Lamont Scott the night Carr was killed.
Lozano testified that an X-ray showed a “minute fragment” of metal in his scalp that was too small to recover. The fragment would not have been useful to the forensic investigation, he said.
As the Observer has previously reported, Carr’s autopsy showed that he was shot near his left ear and the bullet exited through his right forehead.
Some activists argued that he was killed with a rubber bullet from police, but when Carr’s autopsy came out in late 2016, forensic experts told the Observer his injuries were caused by a typical bullet.
In response to questions from Darlene Harris, one of Borum’s defense attorneys, Lozano said he remembered telling the defense team that a long, thin rod or some kind of explosive, like a grenade, could have caused the injuries.
Over strong objections from prosecutors, the defense team has previously suggested that fragments from devices used by CMPD that night — including tear-gas canisters and flashbang grenades, which cause a loud sound and flash of light — could have led to Carr’s death.
In court, Lozano said he’s confident that the actual cause was a bullet. No long, thin object was found, he said. In the case of the grenade, he was referring to much stronger, military-grade explosives that would have also caused other injuries.
Several members of Carr’s family have attended every day of Borum’s trial. At least three family members walked out when the jury began to look at photos of his body during Lozano’s testimony Monday afternoon. His mother stayed in the room, leaning on one of Carr’s brothers.
This story was originally published March 4, 2019 at 5:57 PM.
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