A week after police found the body of homicide victim Cedrick L. Hubbard in his East Lake home, his family is raising questions about how officials handled the investigation.
Mr. Hubbard’s aunt, Sarah Gomilla, sent a letter to Chattanooga Police Department Chief Freeman Cooper and Tennessee Gov. Phil Bredesen on Wednesday about what she termed “the shoddy investigation on the crime scene.”
Officers found the 32-year-old’s body at about 7:45 p.m. on March 7 inside his apartment at 2609 14th Ave. An autopsy revealed Mr. Hubbard died from multiple gunshot and stab wounds, according to the Hamilton County medical examiner’s office.
Police department spokesman Sgt. Rick Mincy said investigators treat each case with the utmost care and follow standard operating procedures at the scene.
“We have a strict policy, and our guys do a real good job at what they do,” he said.
Mr. Hubbard’s mother, Dollie, said she last saw her son alive March 4. When Mr. Hubbard repeatedly did not answer his phone March 7, she and a friend went to his apartment. After no one responded, she said, they called police.
Ms. Hubbard said detectives missed fragments of a bullet found in a couch, did not fingerprint a rental car on the property and dropped a restaurant receipt at the scene. The family also claims investigators overlooked a steak knife found near the car and released the crime scene before it was sterilized, exposing the family to hazardous waste, according to Ms. Gomilla’s letter.
“I don’t think that (investigators) did a thorough investigation,” Ms. Hubbard said Friday from Tampa, Fla. The family left Chattanooga on Wednesday because they felt threatened by the “spying” actions of investigators, she said.
Sgt. Mincy said detectives are following leads and have interviewed a suspect, but they have not arrested anyone in the case.
Ms. Hubbard said she learned her son’s cause of death from a TV report and was not allowed to see his body at the crime scene or the medical examiner’s office.
“That’s my child, and I should have been the first to know about what was going on before they released anything to the press,” she said.
Officials at the medical examiner’s office declined comment Friday. But Detective James Holloway, who is handling the case, said investigators rarely allow next of kin to view the body at a crime scene.
Mr. Hubbard was identified via photo identification found at his residence, Detective Holloway said.
Hamilton County records show that Mr. Hubbard was arrested in September 2002 and charged with possession of marijuana. He also was arrested and charged with domestic aggravated assault and vandalism in February 2002, records show.
But Ms. Hubbard said she does not think her son was in trouble, and she wants anyone with information to contact police.
“I really don’t know if it was random,” she said. “I really don’t know what the cause or the reason of it was, because Cedrick was a very quiet person.”
