A black substance was found in the intestine of Sylvester Oromoni, a student of Dowen College, Lekki, Lagos, who died in controversial circumstances last year, a pathologist at the Lagos State University Teaching Hospital, Ikeja told an inquest Tuesday.
A coroner inquest was opened after Oromoni’s family insisted the boy died from being attacked and poisoned by senior students of the school, allegations which the state director of public prosecution and the school have refuted.
The pathologist Dr Sunday Soyemi spoke while being cross-examined by the family’s lawyer, Femi Falana (SAN).
Soyemi said he did not carry out any test on the black substance found in the deceased’s intestine on the grounds that LASUTH did not have a laboratory to test poisonous substances.
He further admitted that the substance found in the intestine could have been anything as it was not tested to confirm what it was.
Soyemi also denied authorising a television interview granted by the doctor representing Dowen College, Dr Iwikwe Isabella, who spoke on the autopsy findings.
He said, “That’s not the practice. I was embarrassed when the report was being discussed on TV. I was embarrassed in the sense that she didn’t perform the autopsy; she observed all through. It’s not the normal practice even if you have done the autopsy.”
Soyemi, who noted that his findings showed that the deceased had lobar pneumonia, infection of the lung, liver, and also infection on the right ankle, maintained that the deceased died of septicaemia.
He explained that if the deceased was physically assaulted or beaten, all the exposed areas would show haemorrhage.
