Johnny Cashman: Death Scene, Family Claims, and Virginia Law

Johnny Cashman’s death in April 2022 remains officially unresolved: the 38-year-old was found in his Lynchburg, Virginia apartment, police ruled it a medical event without an autopsy, and the Commonwealth’s Attorney declined to file charges in October 2022 even after surveillance footage showed another man leaving the bloody scene minutes after Cashman walked inside. His family maintains he was killed and that the Lynchburg Police Department’s early handling of the case destroyed the chance to prove it.

How Cashman Was Found

Cashman was discovered dead in his studio apartment on Kemper Street on April 19, 2022, five days after he was last seen alive. The Lynchburg Police Department classified the death as “medical-related” and told the family there was no sign of murder or violence. The Office of the Chief Medical Examiner declined to perform an autopsy, relying on the police assessment that blood at the scene was consistent with a gastrointestinal bleed. The examiner’s report noted “blood with fecal matter found around home, likely GI bleed per investigators” and found “no trauma, no drugs, nothing suspicious.”¹

Acting on that assurance, the Cashman family arranged cremation through a Lynchburg funeral home. No relative had been inside the apartment. His sister Sara Cashman later said the family agreed to cremation because they had been told the case was closed and the death was natural.

What the Family Found Ten Days Later

On April 29, 2022, Cashman’s ex-girlfriend and her mother entered the apartment to collect belongings. The scene did not match the official account. Photographs showed blood throughout the bathroom, on a chair, by a window, smeared on doors and walls, and bloody handprints on the bathroom door frame.¹

A neighbor’s doorbell camera, recorded April 14, showed Cashman walking into his apartment at 3:03 p.m. looking healthy. Within a minute a man inside could be heard yelling, “Dude, what the f***, what are you doing man?” followed by banging and the repeated command “stop!” At 3:11 p.m. a man later identified as Steven Church of Elizabethton, Tennessee, left the apartment, closed the door, then turned back and wiped the door handle with his sleeve. After he was gone, a voice from inside the apartment could be heard screaming, “Help! Help! Help!”¹

The family also pointed to Cashman’s medical records from a full exam on December 29, 2021 and a follow-up visit in late January 2022, which showed no gastrointestinal problems. That record cut against the GI-bleed theory the medical examiner had accepted.

Why the Family Says Police Were Negligent

According to the family, Lynchburg police collected the neighbor’s doorbell footage on the day Cashman’s body was discovered but failed to act on the audio and video showing an apparent struggle, and officers told relatives no further investigation was needed before the apartment had been thoroughly examined.¹

Sara Cashman argued that officers were quick to label the death medical because of her brother’s history. Cashman had struggled with depression and alcoholism and had been diagnosed with anxiety, bipolar disorder, and hypertension. “They didn’t investigate until we reached out and said hey something happened here,” she told WSET.²

After the family produced the footage and the apartment photos, Lynchburg officers returned on the nights of April 29 and April 30 to collect additional evidence. A search warrant showed they took six swabs and a cellphone. On May 2 the department released images asking the public to help identify the man leaving the apartment. He was identified on May 11 as Steven Church.¹

Steven Church’s Account

Neighbors told investigators Church had been staying with Cashman for several days. Once identified, Church spoke with police. He acknowledged arguing with Cashman but denied the dispute turned physical, saying Cashman was “drunk but fine” when he left. He said he wiped the door handle because he had prior aggravated burglary convictions and did not want to be accused of squatting.²

Why No Charges Were Filed

On October 7, 2022, Lynchburg Commonwealth’s Attorney Bethany Harrison announced that no charges would be filed, citing a lack of evidence after a review of crime scene photos, video, and forensic findings. Harrison emphasized two points. The pattern of blood loss showed no shoe prints in the blood other than Cashman’s own, and his medical history, prescriptions, and risk factors were consistent with a “fatal medical event.” She acknowledged that the cremation before the investigation was fully underway had made it “more difficult to find out exactly what happened to him.”²

What Virginia Law Requires in a Death Like This

Virginia Code § 32.1-283 requires the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner to be notified of deaths that are sudden when the person was in apparent good health, deaths unattended by a physician, and deaths occurring in any “suspicious, unusual, or unnatural manner.” On notification, the office is to take charge of the body and investigate the cause and manner of death. The statute leaves the “nature, character, and extent of the investigation,” including whether to order an autopsy, to the Chief Medical Examiner’s discretion.³

In Cashman’s case the examiner declined the body based on the police department’s initial assessment rather than an independent examination. No autopsy was performed, the body was then cremated, and once the investigation reopened there was no way to make a definitive forensic finding about trauma.

Where the Case Stands

Sara Cashman rejected Harrison’s conclusions and the suggestion that the decision would bring closure, calling it a “punch in the gut” and accusing officials of protecting the reputations of the police department and the medical examiner’s office. She disputed the portrayal of her brother as incapacitated before his death, pointing to doorbell footage of him walking up the stairs and into his apartment without difficulty. “They try to focus on my brother being drunk and incoherent,” she told WSET. “He had no problem getting back up those stairs and into the apartment, didn’t show any signs of a person who was about to have a major medical event that would ultimately lead to their death.”²

No one has been charged in connection with Johnny Cashman’s death.

1
WSET. Gruesome Scene Has Family Questioning LPD’s Death Investigation
2
WSET. Commonwealth’s Attorney Announces No Charges in Death of John Cashman
3
Virginia Code Commission. Code of Virginia, Title 32.1, Chapter 8, Article 1