Death of Mikayla Miller, a Black LGBTQ teen, deemed suicide despite lynching allegations

The Massachusetts medical examiner concluded that the death of Mikayla Miller, a Black LGBTQ teen, was a suicide, The Boston Globe reports.

Her family has alleged she may have been lynched by a group of white teens and that local authorities have thus far conducted an inadequate investigation.

Ms Miller was found on 18 April hanging from a tree near her house in Hopkinton, Massachusetts.

“My concern is, did they really thoroughly look at the crime scene?” Calvina Strothers, Ms Miller’s mother, has previously said. “Or did they just dismiss it because she’s a Black girl on a tree in Hopkinton?”

The day before her death, according to local officials and Ms Miller’s family, the girl was the victim of a physical assault from a group of teens, which left her with a bloody lip.

Local officials have said the group included at least two people, a boy and a girl, while a spokesperson for the Miller family has said at least five people were there, including a girl who had recently been in a relationship with Ms Miller.

Later that night, Ms Strothers called Hopkinton police to report that her daughter had been “jumped.”

Police initially told the family their daughter had died by suicide.