Search Warrants Shed New Light On Officer's Death
PEMBROKE PINES (CBSMiami) - CBS4 News has uncovered more search warrants that shed new light on the investigation into the death of a Miami Police Officer Carl Patrick.
The documents show the medical examiner has ruled his death a homicide.
Tiniko Thompson, Patrick's girlfriend, has maintained that Officer Patrick accidentally shot himself while the two had a struggle in his Pembroke Pines home.
However autopsy results say differently and we now know detectives are working on their case in part by tracking Thompson and Patrick's cell phones.
Surveillance video, just hours after Patrick was shot, captured Thompson talking on the phone at a storage facility where she is seen pulling up in Patrick's car. It's also not clear whose phone Thompson was talking on.
Search warrants reveal, "[Patrick's] phone was removed from the house where the homicide occurred and was later recovered in Dade County."
The documents also show that detectives want to study the phone calls, emails, voice mails and locations of those cell phones in the days leading up to and after Patrick's death.
Sources say after Patrick was shot, he lay dying in the home for as long as two to six hours.
Police are now calling Patrick's killing a murder investigation.
In the documents, police write that, "the death of the victim [Patrick] has been ruled a homicide by the Broward County Medical Examiner."
The Medical Examiner told CBS4 News that means death investigators do not believe at this point that Patrick died from an accidental shooting or a self-inflicted gunshot wound, which is how Thompson's attorney Rod Vereen says it happened.
"My client acted in self-defense," said Vereen. "At the end of the day she defended herself. She did not pull the trigger on that firearm. He pulled the trigger himself."
However after the shooting happened sources tell CBS 4 News that police believe Thompson cleaned up the home before leaving. They say police found blood at the bottom of a drain.
CBS4 reached out to Thompson's attorney. He said he hasn't seen the warrant so he will not be commenting.
Investigators still want to speak with Thompson but she has yet to speak with them.
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