Posted on Wed, Apr. 19, 2006

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BOOT CAMP DEATH

Crist raises doubts on autopsy

At a meeting with the parents of a boy who died at a Panama City boot camp, state Attorney General Charlie Crist offered sympathy but refused their request to broadcast his support on television.

BY MARC CAPUTO

mcaputo@MiamiHerald.com

TALLAHASSEE - Florida's attorney general met with the parents of Martin Lee Anderson on Tuesday to offer his condolences for the death of their son at a Panama City boot camp and pledge his future support, but stopped short of a request by the parents to make his views known on television.

In the intimate 30-minute meeting, Attorney General Charlie Crist also said it was ''unbelievable'' that a nurse rendered almost no aid to the teen, and cast doubt on the official autopsy claiming the 14-year-old died of natural causes from a blood disorder -- not from the Jan. 5 beating, captured on video, by numerous camp guards.

''It was very disturbing,'' Crist said of the video, which The Miami Herald sued the state to obtain.

`YOU DON'T INTERFERE'

Still, Crist said, he won't touch the case right now because it has been assigned to a special prosecutor, Mark Ober, a friend of Crist's from the Tampa area. Ober ordered a second autopsy last month, the results of which have yet to be released, though his office did say it showed the boy did not die of natural causes.

''One thing you do in law and criminal justice is you don't interfere with other investigations. I don't want to step on Mr. Ober's toes,'' Crist told the parents. He said his office still could initiate a civil-rights action if the criminal investigation yields nothing or if legislation designed to reform boot camps fails.

Martin's parents, Robert Anderson and Gina Jones, said they appreciated Crist's decision to meet with them, but wanted more help. Crist, who hugged Jones at one point, is the highest-level state official and the only one of the four major candidates for governor to meet them. The two Democrats, Rod Smith and Jim Davis, have said little except when asked, and Crist's Republican opponent, Tom Gallagher, refuses to comment at all, despite a ''pro-life'' campaign platform premised on protecting children.

Supporters of the family plan to have a march in Tallahassee on Friday headlined by the Revs. Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton. Miami state Sen. Frederica Wilson said she wants to bus residents from Miami to take part.

That's not enough for the parents, who want an arrest. They want the new autopsy to be released, and they want the residents of the small conservative community of Panama City to see that the state's top lawyer is in the family's corner.

'If we can just do it on TV, for them back there. Because right now [the guards] are saying, `So far nothing's been done' and they're going to get away with it. Just something public. You know, your sorrow,'' Gina Jones told Crist.

Said Crist: ``I'm sorry for your loss. I can't imagine what that's like.''

''You're right,'' she responded. ``If only you would walk in those shoes, then you'll know. Being impatient -- very -- that's what we are right now.''

CLOUD OF DOUBT

Jones said she visited her son's grave Sunday with an Easter basket. She buried him, then saw his coffin exhumed and wrapped in evidence tape for the second autopsy, only to be buried again. Martin, a good student and chess champ, was sent to the Bay Boot Camp on Jan. 5 after he was caught joyriding in his grandmother's car.

Hours later, he was flown to an emergency center in Pensacola, where he was pronounced dead. His body was sent back to Bay County's medical examiner, Charles Siebert, at the request of the sheriff who ran the boot camp. But the parents and their attorney, Benjamin Crump, saw a conspiracy, especially after Siebert decided that their son died of natural causes from sickle-cell trait, a blood ailment primarily affecting people of African descent.

Even Crist's father, a doctor, was surprised, the attorney general said.

Though Martin's parents still have serious doubts about the justice system -- especially after the head of the state investigation into the case was found to have sent friendly e-mails to Bay County's sheriff -- Crist urged them to ``have faith.''

''I wanted to have a chance to look in your eye to let you know people care. And it's real. It's real,'' Crist said. ``Whether I go on TV or not, my job is to make sure justice is done. And when the governor directed it to Mr. Ober, it gave me good confidence that justice will be done.''