Coroner's inquest findings

[November 03, 2008]  A coroner's inquest was held at the Logan County Safety Complex on Thursday for the case of Jon James Liesman.

Liesman, a 34-year-old Atlanta man, was involved in a one-vehicle, two-occupant accident in rural Atlanta on Aug. 6 at 11:14 p.m. He was the passenger in a 2004 Rubicon Jeep. Liesman was taken to Abraham Lincoln Memorial Hospital by Logan County Paramedics and at 11:59 p.m. was pronounced deceased by the emergency room staff.

This inquest was to determine the cause and manner of death for Mr. Liesman.

Coroner Robert Thomas conducted the inquest with eight jurors present. Trooper Price, an accident reconstruction officer with the Illinois State Police, gave testimony about the crash. Testimony at the inquest revealed that the Jeep was traveling west on County Road 2550th Street. The vehicle stopped and began moving in reverse when it entered the roadway ditch and rolled once.

Deputy Coroner Doug Brooks gave testimony about the autopsy findings. Jessica H. Bowman, M.D, performed the autopsy, and her findings were that the cause of death was "blunt force injury to the body."

After deliberation, the jurors returned with a verdict of "accidental death" as the manner of death. The jurors' choices, by state statute, were either accident, homicide, natural causes, suicide or undetermined.

[Text from file received from Robert Thomas, Logan County coroner]