by Randy Gopaul
An independent forensic pathologist from the United States with whom I shared the public details of the Adrianna case raised serious concerns about the credibility and completeness of the ‘official’ postmortem report into the tragic death of 11-year-old Adriana Younge, whose body was discovered in the pool of a Georgetown hotel on April 24, 2025.
The Guyana Police Force issued a press release on Monday claiming that three pathologists had concluded Adriana’s death was a drowning with “no signs of foul play.” But according to my anonymous source, a veteran forensic consultant with over 25 years of international experience, the report appears to be “sloppily generalized, procedurally vague, and far too conclusive given the unresolved questions surrounding the case.”
“We are dealing with the suspicious death of a child in a controlled environment,” said my source, who spoke on condition of anonymity, in a telephone interview. “You don’t close a case like this with boilerplate statements and bold headlines. You conduct a transparent, data-rich, and scientifically rigorous investigation. This appears to be none of those.”
My source criticized the police’s use of decomposition theory to explain how Adriana’s body may have sunk and later floated to the surface.
“It’s a medically plausible theory,” he acknowledged, “but only when backed by clear forensic data. Where is the postmortem interval? Where’s the analysis of livor mortis patterns? Where is the timeline reconstruction? These are basics.”
He further noted that the press release’s reference to the body having “likely sank to the bottom of the pool” reveals a significant gap.
“When pathologists start using words like ‘likely’ and ‘probably’ in a definitive public statement, it tells you they’re guessing, not proving,” said Dr. Reece. “The police want this case closed. That’s very different from solving it.”
The overseas pathologist also expressed alarm at the absence of any detailed analysis of pool security, witness interviews, or video surveillance.
“You’ve got a minor last seen in a hotel pool, then found dead hours later in the same location, with zero mention of who was on duty, who had access, or whether footage even exists. That’s either poor investigation or a cover-up.”
He called into question the use of a retired RCMP investigator to validate the findings.
“You don’t send a desk-review consultant to sanitize an incomplete report. If he wasn’t here on the ground, collecting independent evidence, his opinion is worth very little.”
The Younge family has reportedly rejected the findings and is now pursuing a second autopsy in the United States. Civil society groups and members of the legal fraternity have also begun calling for an independent inquest.
“When you lose public confidence, as the police clearly have in this case, the only ethical response is external oversight,” reveal my source. “What we need now is an international forensic audit of the entire case. Anything less is a disservice to this child and to the cause of justice in Guyana.”
The Ministry of Home Affairs has not responded to requests for comment.
