In April 2010, I wrote the Wayne County Medical Examiner’s Office a letter explaining who I was and requesting the autopsy report for my brother Tim. I enclosed the $50 fee. I later received a copy of the autopsy report.
A few years later, a television series was filming a segment on the OCCK case. It was the first national exposure for the case in many decades. The crew interviewed Dr. Werner Spitz, who was the medical examiner who performed the autopsy on Tim. He spoke openly with the interviewer and provide copies of his notes from his file. This included a transcription of the examination discussion, which included some police, who ask questions during the examination. We were given copies of this transcription and another report by the crew. The pages are not numbered. The yellow highlighting is mine; all other marks, including a cross-out, were previously on the page and were there when we were given this copy. The contents are extremely disturbing, I warn you in advance and you may want to skip this part.
I am posting these documents so it is plain to see what is involved here. This is a case the state police let go cold. Every Oakland County prosecutor since then has looked away. This case was a loser; you can’t prosecute; you can’t bring these kids back from the dead. This is what happened to one of those kids. There it is, in all its horror, on the page.
I am not posting them so there can be extended debate about what is contained in them. We have had these documents for quite a few years and I have read them multiple times. The transcription is hard to follow and I have no idea what some of it means. Keep in mind that the autopsy occurred after the state police lab examined Tim’s body and clothing for evidence.
I am also posting these documents so that if by chance you are someone who knows who was involved in these killings and you kept your mouth shut, this is what your silence helped do to Victim #4.
May i ask… has anyone in your family every been able to personally speak to Werner Spitz? I have wondered this in the past. Thanks and BEST to you.
so none of the samples taken at autopsy and the pubic hair are still in evidence ??
They still exist. I will post about this in the next few days.
I hope somebody who profitted from the elder Busch’s money sees this. Especially those involved in allowing this fat, filthy monster to escape retribution, unlike Greene, who had no ‘connections’.
This is the first I’ve heard about a pubic hair. This whole coverup stinks to high heaven.
Wow, I was an Oakland County kid at the time. Reading those documents is one heck of an eye opener. I could throw up. I remember clearly that the result of all of this was the press repeating how well the victims were cared for, bathed, clean and fed. What a farce. As usual I say a little prayer that the truth comes out.
Yes, a farce. And anytime someone gets close, there is a disinformation campaign. No one in LE will ever even admit there were errors, let alone take responsibility.
Liar for hire. That’s the Dr’s well earned reputation.
My impression of him was that he was competent and kind. This is from the interview I saw. He said something along the lines of “you never forget the kids” who were autopsied.
When I have more spare time I’ll embellish on the subject of Dr Werner Spitz.
Please do – we’re all waiting with bated breath 😒 what kind of expertise do you have, exactly?
Mr Spitz is particularly known for his work in the Casey Anthony case where he implied that the police staged her daughter’s body to look like a murder. He also worked for the defense team of serial killer, Richard Ramirez where he attempted to argue Ramirez was innocent, further he worked for Phil Spector’s defense team, where he attempted to argue that his murder victim spontaneously shot herself. And he also worked for the defense in the West Memphis Three case, in which he argued that wild dogs dove underwater, and ate parts of the murder victims in that case and bashed their head on rocks after death, because the defense in the case was paying him to say such claims, when in reality the victims were beaten with sticks and mutilated with a large knife before being submerged in a ditch. He was making the claims to try and dispute a series of confessions by one of the killers.
He has a bad reputation in recent years.
Another hobby sleuth who knows it all.
I think that is Dr. Sillery’s reputation.
Liar for hire I mean. Dr. S.
Of course Werner Spitz is very much alive and shows up on TV shows about murder. I hope you can get him to talk to you, Cathy.
Well, now we know where the cleaned-up myth came from. No doubt some reporter got some detective to have a cup of coffee and was told the bodies (body) were remarkably clean. And so on to the presses with that one. Leading ME to believe for decades that this extravagant cleanliness meant the perp was a priest with a guilty conscience.
Last comment for today: I found most of the redactions to be so insignificant. Strangely slated for redaction when it’s obviously just a common word, not an identification of anybody. Didn’t it strike you that way, too? I mean, we’re already talking about horrifying, right?
This from an Anonymous Reader:
Hi Cathy, I read over the autopsy report you just posted with the two links.
When I read over the second link you provided involving Dr. Spitz and other examiners it sure reads to me like they are discussing . the possibility of an object was used after on the boy after death. This was discussed around page 9 (Page count) or at least the possibility that the symptoms show that might have occurred in that way.
Coincidentally, this is the very same thing that Helen’s suspect (John H) described he did to the boys which is very weird now to see it in print and of all places, the autopsy report! Am I reading that correctly? Do others see it that way?
When I read the Lou Gordon (Dr. Emanuel Tanay) newspaper article you posted previously it also kind of hints at homosexual tendencies without actually doing a sexual act. Although this is cryptic in nature perhaps it was worded this way for the newspaper audience. Does this perhaps also indicate an object was used after death? Does anyone else read it this way or is it just me?
Also based on that article, Dr. Tanay was to discuss it on the Lou Gordon show. Unfortunately the Lou Gordon show was under the Kaiser Broadcasting Corp. which went out of business shortly after that show was produced, which may be why the show was never maintained and no longer available anywhere. Lou Gordon also died a few months later.
I wonder if the late Dr. Tanay was one of them participating in the discussion with Dr. Spitz documented in your link? Looking into Dr. Tanay’s credentials on LinkedIn, he had a very impressive background documented as a retired Clinical Professor of Psychiatry at the Medical School of Wayne State University from 1958-2001. He has many publications as a Forensic Psychiatrist and was involved with investigations of some famous crimes in his day.
One last question that was already asked by your readers. Is Dr. Spitz still alive and more importantly could he clear up any confusion in this old document? Would he shed any light on all of this after all of these years or at least fill in a few blanks?
Anonymous Reader
I’d disagree on the discussion of an object after death. It can sometimes be difficult at autopsy to confirm whether a victim was sexually assaulted if there’s no “tearing” present, which would indicate for certain that a victim was sexually assaulted. Spitz talks about an “irritation” or “rubbing” present, and then after that there’s a redaction.
I personally discount all this stuff like the “John” suspect and these murder novel type motives involving symbolism. This was an organized offender with a clear sexual motive, with a well thought out crime, involving an abduction site, an unknown murder scene, and a dump site. Organized offenders tend to be older; late 20’s and up in age. If the purpose was just simply to kill a child, there was no need to keep a victim alive and fed, an unnecessary element unless there’s a sexual motive, keeping a victim until they no longer can. Serial killers such as Jeffrey Dahmer attempted this with adult men, drugging them and attempting lobotomies on his victims in order to try and keep them in his apartment like an object he could take out and put away whenever he felt like, and then kill when he could no longer do so.
Bear in mind that then 9 year old Burke Ramsey was cleared and in writing very early in the Ramsey murder case, and based on solid evidence. For Spitz to have been involved in the Sept 2016 CBS “The Case of JonBenet Ramsey,” which was the killer’s camp propaganda, proved that he’s ‘liar for hire.’ CBS rightfully lost the massive lawsuit that followed, and if Spitz hasn’t already lost the massive one against him just yet, then it’s simply justice delayed. Case evidence shows that the victim was alive and clawing at the parachute cord around her neck, suffered through two strangulation events, and had less than a teaspoon of blood in her cranium, meaning she was practically dead before receiving the massive blow to the back of her head, not the top as depicted by Spitz. The Ramsey murder was and is several layers of very very despicable acts against the victim and her family members. Fortunately, the so-called ransom note is actually a journal which carries lots of evidence about that crime and several other highly organized heinous crimes.