Fact 7: The Forensic Significance of My Son’s Final Position and Firearm Placement

Life keeps moving, whether I want it to or not. So does the time since I last hugged my son, since I last heard his voice say, “Hi, Mom.” No amount of time will make writing this any easier. Going back through the details of his death to share the facts about his case means facing that distance head-on, returning to the worst moment of my life and carrying the weight of his final moments all over again.

Though grief is personal, evidence is not.

Awareness cannot remain on a page. It must lead to accountability and meaningful change. My son’s life matters. That is why I will continue documenting the facts. 

In my last blog, Fact 6, I shared that Jaren was found lying supine on the floor. To understand why that detail matters, it’s important to understand what his injury would have done to his body at that moment, as documented in his autopsy.

My son’s autopsy showed a catastrophic brainstem injury. The wound track passed through his lower jaw area and the base of his skull, penetrating the clivus and splitting the pons. The pons is a key part of the brainstem that controls his breathing, heart rate, and consciousness. When the pons is destroyed, a person loses consciousness right away and dies within seconds. With such a severe injury of this magnitude, there is no chance for any purposeful movement or adjustment. The body simply falls where gravity takes it.

In forensic pathology, where the body is found often relates to where items like firearms end up. In cases of immediate incapacitation, grip is lost the moment collapse begins, and weapons typically fall near the hand. Research on self-inflicted gunshot deaths confirms this pattern: in most cases, the firearm remains in the hand or within about a foot of the body, and placement farther away is uncommon. While the position of a firearm at a death scene can be influenced by variables, dismissing its evidentiary value entirely overlooks well-documented biomechanical and physical factors for how it moves. *In a review of 574 documented suicide cases, the firearm remained in the deceased’s hand in approximately 24% of cases, was found on or near the body in about 69%, and was located more than a foot away in only 7% of cases. This data shows that while there is some variation, statistically, most firearms come to rest close to the body.

Jaren’s case does not follow these patterns. He was found lying flat on his back, with his head near the dresser, hands open and palms up, and his feet tucked under the bed, with the firearm’s slide pointed towards the door and pinned under his left knee. For the firearm to end up there, with the grip facing towards his feet while his body remained supine, would require a very specific and unusual sequence of movements: dropping the firearm, his body moving separately as he fell, and his leg ending up over the firearm. Most people who suffer instantaneous incapacitation are found slumped forward or to the side, with the weapon close to the hand. Jaren’s final position, flat on his back with the firearm beneath his knee, is highly unusual given the mechanics of the gunshot injury. A firearm found in an unusually shielded position requires close consideration of what might have happened, rather than assuming “anything is possible,” a remark made by an official to me.

I cannot escape the questions it raises because the facts insist on it. These are not imagined inconsistencies in Jaren’s case. They are right there in the evidence and demand attention. The severity of my son’s brainstem injury, the unusual position of his body, and the location of the firearm do not match established forensic profiles for self-inflicted gunshot wounds. 

Fact 7 does not stand alone. When placed alongside the earlier facts, it adds to a growing pattern of unanswered questions and investigative gaps that cannot be ignored. The cumulative weight of this evidence warrants reopening my son’s case. The police have not shown that they thoroughly vetted Mariana’s alibi, the person present at the scene (Fact 1), vetted other witness statements, including her parents’, examined her phone records, analyzed available video evidence, or canvassed other tenants. The medical examiner, confronted with inconsistencies (Fact 2), including the intermediate firing range (Fact 3), the trajectory (Fact 4), the wound location, and the absence of suicide indicators (Fact 5), confirmed that his autopsy findings pointed to something else. These unresolved issues led him to question why the scene was never treated as a potential homicide. Critical forensic details, including how the firearm came to rest beneath Jaren’s knee and why two distinct blood pools were present (Fact 6), remain unexplained. 

The Guam Police Department remained fixed on a single theory. Even in the face of all this evidence, they did not waver. But I will continue to waver from silence. When evidence demands closer examination, it deserves to be heard. 

*Garavaglia, J.C., et al. (1999). Weapon location following suicidal gunshot wounds. The American Journal of Forensic Medicine and Pathology, 20(3), 248–250.