Image shows final moments of teen found dead at school gym
In 2013, 17-year-old Kendrick Johnson was found dead, his body stuffed in a wrestling mat that was leaning against a wall in his high school gym.
Newly released video shows the Georgia teen’s final moments, adding another layer of mystery to what his parents insist was “murder.”
Keep reading to learn about one of America’s most controversial unsolved mysteries! *WARNING: Graphic image included in story*
Jackie Johnson is still looking for answers over what happened to her 17-year-old son, Kendrick, who was found dead in his high school gym.
“This is a pain you can’t even begin to imagine,” the grieving mom wrote in an October 22, 2024, Facebook post.
Attached is the image of Kendrick, who would have celebrated his 29th birthday on October 10. “One day it might be your turn to watch a casket being closed on your child,” Jackie warns.
On January 10, 2013, the teenager – last seen alive about 1:09 p.m. in the gymnasium –missed his fourth-period class and did not come home from school, prompting his family to file a missing person’s report that night.
Meanwhile, members of the basketball and color guard teams gathered that same evening, unaware that a fellow student was dead in the same space.
The next day, Kendrick’s body was found upside down, inside a vertical rolled-up mat leaning up against a wall in the school’s gymnasium.
According to local media, a pair of Nike shoes was found in the mat with Kendrick, and one black and white Adidas shoe was found near the teen in a pool of blood. The second shoe was discovered on the floor in front of one of the mats in the gym.
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“It felt unreal. You know I sent my child to school for an education and he did go to school one way and came back dead,” his mother, Jackie told CNN shortly after the death of her son, an athlete at Lowndes High School in Valdosta, Georgia. “It’s unbearable, just about. The only thing that wakes you up in the morning is to just keep pushing.”
Despite the bizarre nature of maintaining that an athlete would fall into a matt and die of asphyxiation, investigators quickly ruled Kendrick’s death as accidental.
Organs replaced with paper
But his parents insist that someone killed their boy and the couple pursued a wrongful death lawsuit against the Lowndes County Board of Education, asserting that the actual circumstances of Kendrick’s “murder” was deliberately concealed.
First, Jackie and Kenneth – Kendrick’s dad – commissioned a private autopsy, which revealed the teen died from blunt force trauma, inconsistent with the original findings of “positional asphyxia.”
Two subsequent exhumations – 2013 and 2018 – revealed alarming details, including the absence of Kendrick’s internal organs – from his pelvis to his skull – that were replaced with newspaper, which CNN reports is “not consistent with the standards of care.”
“Like he was a garbage can,” says Jackie of her son’s body being stuffed with paper, adding that his organs were never found.
Adding another layer of mystery is that vital information in CCTV footage appears to be “altered.”
Video shows Kendrick briskly walking into the school gym about 1:09 p.m., the last time he was seen alive.
Grant Fredericks, a forensic video analyst, suggests that an hour of the footage is “missing.” “(The surveillance video has) been altered in a number of ways, primarily in image quality and likely in dropped information, information loss,” Fredericks tells CNN. “There are also a number of files that are corrupted because they’ve not been processed correctly and they’re not playable. I can’t say why they were done that way, but they were not done correctly, and they were not done thoroughly. So we’re missing information.”
The Johnson family pursued civil lawsuits and pushed for federal investigations into potential foul play, including allegations of racial motivation. Despite extensive inquiries, the Department of Justice found insufficient evidence to prosecute.
Ongoing investigations
In 2021, the investigation into Kendrick Johnson’s death was reopened, but Lowndes County Sheriff Ashley Paulk ultimately upheld the initial conclusion that the death was accidental. This decision deeply frustrated the Johnson family, who remained convinced their son had been murdered.
By January 2022, the case was officially closed again, despite ongoing protests from Kendrick’s parents. Sheriff Paulk later released a summary of the case, asserting that “any objective review” of the evidence would reveal it was impossible to conceal information, given the involvement of numerous agencies and investigators.
“The FBI states unequivocally in its investigation that there was no cover-up or conspiracy,” says Paulk, adding that the investigation has turned into a “witch hunt.” “I am quite sure that there will still be a contingent that will believe there was foul play. I encourage everyone to study ALL the evidence in this file before forming an opinion.”
Calling the sheriff’s conclusions a “cover up,” Jackie and Kenneth launched a $1 billion lawsuit against the Georgia Bureau of Investigation and the Lowndes County Sheriff’s Office about what they claim is “false information” connected to the investigation into his death.
“We are going to continue to keep fighting for Kendrick because his life mattered, Jackie said of the September 2023 filing. “It’s a shame that we have been having to fight for 10 long years and nobody seems to care about Kendrick. He’s just another child that they want to sweep under the rug.”
She adds, “They killed the wrong child, but they got the right parents because we are going to continue to fight for Kendrick.”
The 2021 documentary Finding Kendrick Johnson explores the investigation into the teenager’s suspicious death and how it sparked more than a decade’s worth of investigations, controversies, and the alleged cover-up.
What do you think happened to Kendrick? Please share your thoughts with us and then share this story with your friends so we can hear what they have to say about this unsolved case!
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