The Erie County District Attorney's Office has revealed that Larrinsha Johnson, 18, the Buffalo woman found dead in a car early last Saturday morning in Martin Luther King Jr. Park, was strangled.
The county Medical Examiner's office said the preliminary cause of death was asphyxiation due to manual strangulation, and added she was also severely beaten. An official autopsy report is pending.
Johnson was a senior at Math Science Technical Preparatory School in Buffalo. Dozens of members of the school community held a balloon-releasing ceremony at MST in her memory this week.
Her boyfriend, Mushagdusa Nankumba, 18 of Buffalo, was taken into custody shortly after police responded to a suspicious incident call at MLK Park around 2:30 a.m. Saturday. He was charged with second degree murder and is being held without bail at the Erie County Holding Center.
