NYPD and DNAinfo/Jeanmarie Evelly
MANHATTAN — The city Medical Examiner cannot determine what killed Avonte Oquendo, the autistic Queens teen who sparked a citywide manhunt after he fled out of a city school, a spokeswoman said.
Avonte, 14, who could not speak, was last seen alive running out of the Riverview School in October 2013. Family, volunteers and schoolmates papered the city with missing person flyers.
His partially decomposed remains were found washed up on a College Point beach in January.
Avonte’s family filed a $25 million notice of claim form with the city’s comptroller’s office.
“While the report excludes gross evidence of trauma it leaves open questions of what may have happened to Avonte that are not discernable from the body,” David Perecman, the family’s lawyer, said.
An ME official said that tests and autopsy methods have been exhausted for finding out what happened to the teen.
Perecman said that more information when the police release their investigative file.
“Avonte’s mom has mixed feelings,” the lawyer said. “Unfortunately, [it’s] not the complete closure that the parents would have liked.”
