Athens police on Friday said they are uncertain how Widespread Panic’s longtime equipment manager died; was it a homicide or a suicide?
Of was it due to "complications from his recent aneurysm," as reported on the band's website.
Capt. Clarence Holeman with the Athens-Clarke County Police Department said investigators were going to meet with the medical examiner later Friday to offer additional evidence retrieved from 49-year-old Garrie Vereen's house in northern Clarke County.
The medical examiner ruled Thursday that Vereen's death was a homicide.
"Right now were not conceding the fact that it’s a homicide," Holeman told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution Friday. "The medical examiner said that but we've done some more investigating. We went back to the scene after he [the medical examiner] said it was a homicide. We came up with some additional things from the scene that we ... feel it's not a homicide."
Friends had called police around 8:30 a.m. Wednesday to report Vereen had committed suicide. Holeman said Vereen was found in the yard on the side of his house with a "stab wound to the chest."
But Holeman said Vereen's death "could be" a suicide after all.
"He had a stab wound to the chest," Holeman said. "Right now, I can't say who stabbed him. If I say he was stabbed I would be talking myself into a homicide but I don’t think it is."
Holeman said detectives would also discuss the possibility that complications from an aneurysm could have caused the death.
Vereen was equipment manager for the popular Southern jam band for two decades.
Members of the band serenaded the Georgia House of Representatives Tuesday morning as part of the General Assembly's long history of honoring Georgia musicians.
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