Jayland Walker’s autopsy shows he suffered 41 gunshot entry wounds and five graze wounds, medical examiner says

AKRON — Jayland Walker, the unarmed man shot last month by eight Akron police officers while fleeing after a car chase, suffered 41 gunshot entry wounds and five graze wounds, Summit County Chief Medical Examiner Dr. Lisa Kohler said in a press conference Friday morning.

Kohler, who did not conduct the autopsy but signed off on the final autopsy report on Thursday, cautioned that she still could not say for certain how many times Walker was shot because one bullet can cause multiple entrance or graze wounds.

Kohler’s news conference provided the clearest picture yet of the injuries that Walker, a 25-year-old DoorDash employee with no criminal record, suffered in the June 27 shooting after he led officers on a car chase prompted by what police say was an equipment violation. The chase transitioned into a brief foot pursuit before police began to fire.

Akron police said that Walker fired a gunshot during the car chase, and that he made a motion toward his waistband while on foot, prompting officers to shoot.

After the shooting, police said officers found a gun inside Walker’s car. Photos of the gun show the clip had been removed.

Akron police turned over the investigation into the incident to the Ohio Attorney General’s Bureau of Criminal Investigation and have not answered further questions about the shooting, including how many total shots the officers fired. The city is also refusing to provide the names of the officers who shot Walker.

Photos included in the initial autopsy report from the night of the shooting showed that medical examiner’s staff marked more than 60 wounds on Walker’s body, but did not specify whether the injuries were all gunshot wounds, or if they were entrance or exit wounds.

Walker’s autopsy determined that 26 bullets lodged in Walker’s body and 15 went through his body.

Five wounds were discovered on the back of Walker’s body, Kohler said, though she couldn’t determine whether those bullets struck Walker while he was fleeing or rolling on the ground.

Kohler could not state whether any individual bullet caused the fatal injury, though she said that Walker died from blood loss. Several vital organs were struck, including the heart, lungs and right iliac artery. One bullet also struck Walker’s face, fracturing his jaw. The official cause of Walker’s death was multiple gunshot wounds, and the manner was homicide.

“He had several very devastating injuries that would cause death,” said Kohler.

No drugs or alcohol were found in Walker’s system, a toxicology screen revealed.

Kohler said that the office did not conduct a gunshot residue test of Walker’s hands to determine if he may have fired a gunshot. The office stopped doing such tests in 2016 as the accuracy of such tests came into question, she said.

Ken Abbarno, an attorney for the Walker family, said after the press conference that the information from the autopsy can be matched with police body-cam footage to help determine “why these officers shot so many times at an unarmed man, hitting him, what we hear today, potentially up to 46 times.

“It’s going to take a lot of time to process,” he added.

A funeral for Walker was held Thursday in Akron. The officers were placed on administrative leave.

Walker’s death has provoked national outrage and led to large protests and arrests in Akron. The Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation and Ohio attorney general’s office are investigating. The U.S. Department of Justice is also monitoring the situation, President Joe Biden said during a Cleveland visit last week.