30-year law enforcement veteran weighs in on Javion Magee case

HENDERSON, N.C. (WTVD) -- As the family of Javion Magee continues to push for answers about the 21-year-old's death, the Vance County Sheriff's Office is releasing more detailed information about the investigation.

Magee was found one week ago with rope wrapped around his neck, and the rope attached to a tree branch. Magee's current address was listed as being in Aurora, Illinois at the time of his death, and he was in Henderson, North Carolina while on a trucking route. He had started working as a truck driver earlier this year.

Though initial reports led investigators to believe that Magee died by suicide, his family has pushed back against that claim. Rumors on social media went viral claiming that Magee was a victim of a hate crime.

"There's been information put out there that there's a lynching in Vance County. There is not a lynching in Vance County. The young man was not dangling from a tree. He was not swinging from a tree. The rope was wrapped around his neck. It was not a noose. There was not a knot in the rope, so therefore, it was not a lynching here in Vance County," Vance County Sheriff Curtis Brame told ABC11.

Magee's family is not convinced, and along with civil rights attorneys, they are pushing back against the Vance County Sheriff's Office.

On Wednesday, the sheriff's office released a detailed timeline of the events leading up to Magee's death.

To provide more context about the information coming out about the case, ABC11 reached out to an investigator who is uninvolved in the case, hoping to get a more unbiased understanding of what to make of the newly released evidence.

"I learned a long time ago, never say never in this business," 30-year law enforcement veteran Lisa Miller told ABC11. Miller served in many roles in law enforcement but retired as the Chief of Investigations for the Colorado Attorney General's Office.

After looking at all the publicly released evidence in the case, Miller said she had many more questions before being able to draw a conclusion about what really happened, but one thing was clear.

"It's a tale of the hate that we have in this world and the divisiveness that we can't rule out a hate crime after a young man was found, and that has to be acknowledged," she said.

Miller said the publicly released facts don't point directly to a hate crime being committed, or indicate that there was outside involvement in Magee's death. However, she said she couldn't rule that possibility out, and that the investigation needs to continue and be extremely thorough.

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"We have to be really careful because the most deviant of people that want to do bad things are capable of staging scenes to look like suicides," she said. "I can't rule it out."

She pointed to some key pieces of evidence that don't indicate outside involvement in his death, namely that there is a video of him purchasing the rope that was found on his body, that there is a video of him walking alone to where his body would later be found, and that he gave hundreds of dollars to a person who was homeless shortly before his death.

Though his final autopsy report has not been released pending toxicology results, initial reports indicate that there was no evidence he was attacked by someone or that he tried to fight anyone off.

Still, she said more work needs to be done, and that law enforcement has a duty to investigate as thoroughly as possible. That includes something that is sometimes referred to as a "psychological autopsy", where they look into everything leading up to his death and try to understand his state of mind at the time.

The Vance County Sheriff's Office said they have submitted search warrants to get full access to his phone records, which Miller said will be key.

"Find out what he was involved in, what's going on, love, life, friends, things like that," she said.

She also said that she's not surprised that this story went viral and that rumors and theories are spreading on social media.

"We know in this day and time of social media, if there is a void of information, people will fill that void with whatever. So, it's incumbent upon the police department to keep doing their due diligence," she said.

She added that she knows that incidents involving misconduct by different law enforcement agencies across the country have broken some trust with the public and that it's critical to hold agencies accountable and make sure that they are fully investigating.

She also noted that in this case, it appears the Vance County Sheriff's Office is doing a very thorough job from what's being released. She praised them for finding the person who was homeless who said they received money from Magee before his death, and for releasing a detailed timeline.

Miller said there is more work to be done to bring full answers to Magee's family and the community.

"The family may never get a 'why', but 'why's help, and so the sheriff's department, they owe these loved ones every effort they can make to bring the 'why' to the people that care about this young man," she said.

Another point Miller drove home was that it's critical that the public engages with empathy on social media. She said online activism can sometimes help with fact-finding or raising awareness, but it can also harm an investigation. It can hinder people from coming forward with information if they're scared to face public scrutiny, and it can also spread false information that can be harmful to families and investigators.

"You need to remember motives. Some people want to be first. Some people want to be out here just to get more clicks," she said, adding that a lot of people will share without fact-checking. "If you're not sure it's true, don't share it."

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