Attorney Ben Crump held a press conference with Rev. Jesse Jackson and Jelani Day's family to demand the FBI investigate the IL medical student's disappearance and death as a hate crime. Nearly 100 days have passed since his body was discovered and police have only implicated Jelani in his own drowning.
LaSalle County Coroner Richard Ploch has finally officially revealed the cause of Jelani Day's death. But neither Day's family nor his supporters, like Rev. Jesse Jackson, are satisfied with the coroner's report, which they feel implies Day drowned himself.
On Oct. 21, members from The Nu Epsilon chapter of the Omega Psi Phi fraternity at Alabama A&M University started an online petition demanding for state authorities to take over the investigation from the Bloomington Police Department.
Now a new report has surfaced backing up her allegations. The Chicago Sun-Times recently released a story titled "Some things no mother should have to endure" chronicling the moments leading up to Jelani Day's October 9 funeral service. Within the report that questions whether Jelani's case would have been handled differently if he "were not Black and male but a woman who was white and blonde", it includes a heartbreaking moment when Ms. Day got a call from the coroner with "good news." That news was that the "office had received new dental records" and was coming closer to identifying a body found in a river.
Though investigators have yet to release an official cause of death, lawyer Hallie Bezner says the evidence that has been collected thus far suggests "Jelani did not end up in that river willingly."
There's a sad update to report surrounding Jelani Day. A coroner has confirmed that the body of the missing Illinois State University grad student has been identified. LaSalle County Coroner Richard Ploch noted that a male body found "floating near the south bank of the Illinois River approximately ¼ mile east of the Illinois Rt. 251 Bridge of the Illinois River" on Sept. 4 is Jelani Day.
Jelani Day, a 25-year-old grad student and aspiring doctor, was last seen on Aug. 24, reports the Bloomington Police Department.
