Gatti’s family will conduct own investigation

RIO DE JANEIRO – Boxer Arturo Gatti’s body was exhumed Friday to allow the Quebec coroner’s office to perform a new autopsy at his family’s request.

The development comes a day after Brazilian police classified Gatti’s death as a suicide.

Until Thursday, police in the northeastern Brazil city of Recife considered it a homicide, with his wife as the prime suspect. Now, police say Gatti hanged himself with a handbag strap from a staircase column more than 7 feet off the ground.

Gilles Ethier, deputy chief coroner of the western part of Quebec, said Gatti’s family had retained an American pathologist, who will assist with the autopsy this morning at the Montreal morgue.

“Clearly, it’s necessary for us to pursue the investigation,” Ethier said.

Gatti’s Montreal funeral was July 20.

Many of his friends and family have expressed disbelief at the suicide ruling, and Canadian Foreign Minister Lawrence Cannon said in a statement that government officials will seek more information from Brazilian authorities on the Gatti investigation and its findings.

Ellen Haley, a spokeswoman for Main Events, the longtime promoter of Gatti’s bouts, said in a statement “we do not believe that he took his own life.”

She said members of the Gatti family, along with his boxing manager Pat Lynch, will carry out their own investigation. “We believe that once the results of that investigation are revealed, the truth will come to light and justice will be done,” Haley said.