.jpg) Cynthia Sommer
Dr. Stephen Robinson, a board-certified forensic pathologist and assistant medical examiner for the Armed Forces Medical Examiner System, performed the autopsy at the Naval Medical Center in San Diego. Robinson concluded the manner of death was natural and the cause of death was cardiac arrhythmia. He forwarded his findings to the Medical Examiner for the County of San Diego, a facility that was accredited by the National Association of Medical Examiners. The chief medical examiner, Dr. Brian Blackbourne, a board-certified forensic pathologist, agreed and issued a death certificate that stated that the manner of death was natural, and the cause of death was cardiac arrhythmia.
Despite these findings, the Naval Criminal Investigative Service (NCIS) continued to investigate Sommer’s death. At the end of 2002, a military death review panel of NCIS recommended that Sommer’s tissues and serological specimens be tested for heavy metals before closing its inquiry into whether the death was natural.
On May 7, 2003, Jose Centeno, a toxicologist at the Armed Forces Institute for Pathology (AFIP) Environmental Toxicology Laboratory, tested some of Sommer’s tissue preserved from the autopsy and found fatal levels of arsenic in two of the six samples – more than 1,000 times the normal level in his liver, and more than 250 times the normal level in his kidneys. According to a civil complaint Sommer would file in 2009, these levels were higher than any ever seen in the history of arsenic testing.
On October 17, 2003, four NCIS agents consulted with Alphonse Poklis, a board certified forensic toxicologist, the director of the Toxicology Laboratories for the Medical College at Virginia Commonwealth University, and an expert on arsenic poisoning. Poklis told the NCIS investigators that the results of the arsenic testing “didn’t make any sense,” that there was “no evidence Todd Sommer died of arsenic poisoning,” and that the test results were “false.”
NCIS investigators believed that 28-year-old Cynthia Sommer, Todd’s wife, had poisoned him to collect more than $250,000 in insurance benefits and $1,900 per month in survivor benefits.
By this time, Dr. Glenn Wagner, a board-certified forensic pathologist, had replaced Blackbourne as the chief medical examiner in San Diego County. Wagner had been the head of AFIP at the time it conducted the arsenic testing. On October 21, 2005, Wagner changed the manner of death on Sommer’s death certificate to homicide and the cause of death to arsenic poisoning. Cynthia Sommer was arrested in Florida on November 30, 2005, and extradited to California in 2006.
Sommer went to trial in San Diego County Superior Court in January 2007. Robinson testified that if he had the information about arsenic levels in Sommer’s tissue samples, he would have ruled the cause of death arsenic poisoning. Jerry Spencer, a board-certified forensic pathologist for the Armed Forces Medical Examiner System, testified that he had reviewed Robinson’s original autopsy report and Wagner’s amended death certificate and disagreed with Robinson’s original report identifying cardiac arrhythmia as the cause of death. He testified that there was “no other reasonable cause of death” other than arsenic poisoning. He said that arsenic poisoning was “certainly the cause of death looking at all the circumstances available.”
The defense called Poklis, who testified that the lab results were suspect and that the samples were likely contaminated. Poklis testified that Sommer’s medical records showed that he was not sick enough to be suffering from arsenic poisoning, noting that he returned to work for three days after his initial illness. In addition, Poklis said the fact that two tissue samples showed extremely high arsenic levels, while the other four tissue samples and the blood and urine samples all tested negative for arsenic cast doubt on the notion that Sommer was poisoned. Arsenic poisoning, he said, would have resulted in an even distribution of arsenic throughout the body. The concentration of arsenic in only two samples, Poklis said, clearly suggested contamination.
Judge Peter Deddeh had ruled that the prosecution could not present evidence of Cynthia’s behavior after Todd’s death, but the defense counsel raised the issue when he introduced evidence presenting Cynthia Sommer as a grieving widow.
In rebuttal, prosecutor Laura Gunn introduced evidence showing that in the weeks following Todd’s death, Cynthia got breast implants, had sex with several different partners, threw parties, and moved to Florida with a new boyfriend. According to the prosecution, Sommer had also made multiple inquiries about money in the hours immediately following her husband’s death.
On January 30, 2007, a jury convicted Sommer of first-degree murder with the “special circumstances” of murder by poison and murder for financial gain, which made her eligible for a sentence of life in prison without parole.
After Sommer’s conviction, she retained a new attorney, who filed a motion for a new trial and pursued the issue of the unreliability of the lab results. On November 30, 2007, before Sommer was sentenced, Judge Deddeh vacated Cynthia’s conviction and granted her a new trial. He said that her attorney had deprived Sommer of a fair trial by “opening the door” to evidence of her behavior following her husband’s death. The retrial was set for May 2008.
Sommer’s attorney repeatedly requested that the prosecution produce the other tissues preserved from Todd’s autopsy, but Gunn said that no such evidence existed. In March 2008, however, after the defense made a formal discovery demand, the tissue samples were found. The prosecutor later stated that her office had forgotten about the samples.
Testing on the tissue, including samples from Todd’s liver and kidneys, was negative for arsenic. On April 17, 2008, based on these new tests, the prosecution asked the court to dismiss the charges against Sommer, and she was released.
On September 24, 2009, Sommer filed a $20 million lawsuit alleging a conspiracy to wrongfully prosecute her. The lawsuit was dismissed on December 5, 2013. Sommer also sought compensation from the State of California, but her claim was denied.
– Stephanie Denzel
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