Death of Otto Warmbier still a mystery

An Ohio coroner on Wednesday said her office was unable to determine a cause of death for Otto Warmbier but said she found no reason to believe he was tortured during his captivity in North Korea. The 22-year-old college student was returned to his family in a coma in June after more than a year in North Korean custody. He died a week later. The coroner’s report, obtained Tuesday by The Cincinnati Enquirer, said Warmbier died from complications due to brain-damaging oxygen deprivation but did not specify what triggered the damage, except to say it was “an unknown insult [injury] more than a year prior to death.” The coroner’s report was limited to an external examination of Warmbier’s body because his parents refused an autopsy. Fred and Cindy Warmbier, who appeared for the first time on national television Tuesday morning, maintain their son was tortured. “They destroyed him,” said Cindy Warmbier, who said her son was jerking violently, howling, and staring blankly when he returned to the United States. After the Warmbiers’ TV appearances, President Donald Trump tweeted, “Otto was tortured beyond belief by North Korea.”