Medical examiner rules Baltimore Police custody death a homicide
Justin Fenton
The Baltimore Banner
August 28, 2025
Maryland’s chief medical examiner has ruled the death of a man who had been in Baltimore Police custody as a homicide, in what appears to be the first case with such a ruling since a scathing audit.
The ruling comes in the case of 31-year-old Dontae Melton Jr., who appeared to be suffering from a behavioral health crisis on June 24 when he was handcuffed by city officers and fell unconscious and later died at a hospital. The cause of death was withheld, citing the ongoing investigation.
Just weeks before his death, the Office of the Maryland Attorney General delivered an independent audit of police-involved deaths that found the state’s medical examiners, under a previous regime, too often discounted the role of police in concluding deaths during interactions with officers to be accidents or of an “undetermined” nature. That review suggested that three dozen such cases statewide should have been ruled homicides.
A medical determination of homicide means that someone caused the death, but not that a crime was necessarily committed. In a man’s Christmas Eve death in Montgomery County after being restrained by officers, an autopsy concluded his death was a homicide but investigators determined no charges were warranted.
The attorney general’s office, which has primary jurisdiction over all police custody deaths, is continuing to investigate Melton’s death, and on Wednesday released six hours of body camera footage of Melton’s encounter with 10 city officers.
Melton said someone was chasing him and darted into traffic before officers restrained him. Melton can be heard screaming and wailing, and said he couldn’t breathe. He’s seen moving his body to break free of the cuffs and shackles. He attempted to bite officers and cursed at them.
The officers put a red protective helmet on Melton as they waited more than 40 minutes for medics who never arrived before transporting him to the hospital themselves.
“Where is this medic? This is insane,” one officer can be heard saying on the footage, later adding: “I could’ve made a smoke signal by now that would have gotten the fire department here.”
Attorneys for Melton’s family on Thursday noted a hospital was just three minutes away, and said the medical examiner’s ruling confirmed ”what his family knew all along: Dontae’s death was not an accident.”
“It was the direct result of the actions and inactions of those sworn to protect him,” said attorneys Lawrence S. Greenberg, Matthew B. Rogers and Ethan M. Greenberg in a statement.
“His family is demanding answers, transparency and accountability,” the attorneys continued. “They are also calling for systemic reform so that no other family endures the needless loss of a loved one in a moment when help – not harm – was needed most.”
The officers all remain on full duty except for one officer who suffered a shoulder injury, a police spokeswoman said.
In a statement last month, the president of the city’s Fraternal Order of Police lodge blasted the attorney general’s office for singling out police whom he said were let down by other city agencies.
“This was not a dynamic incident like a police officer involved shooting or similar incident,” President Mike Mancuso wrote. “The facts are the officers involved did everything in their power to ensure Mr. Melton received medical treatment and the AG knows this.”