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Case file s493 · Music and sport · 2017
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2017
Aaron Hernandez
Aaron Hernandez. Jeffrey Beall. CC BY 3.0, Wikimedia Commons.
Died
19 April 2017
Place
Souza-Baranowski Correctional Center, Lancaster, Massachusetts · United States
Field
American football (New England Patriots) · Sport on the timeline
Legal tradition
US common law (Massachusetts); abatement ab initio · Common law
Historical event
NFL concussion crisis
Music and sportMurder and sudden deathNowNorth AmericaUnited States

Aaron Hernandez's suicide wiped out his murder conviction, and two years later the state's top court put it back

Former Patriots tight end Aaron Hernandez was serving life for the 2013 murder of Odin Lloyd. Five days after he was acquitted of a separate double homicide, he was found hanged in his cell. He was 27. He had smoked the synthetic drug K2 within 30 hours of his death. Prison officials had seen no signs of suicide risk and had not put him on constant watch. Before his death he had set aside $500,000 for his fiancée and daughter. Under an old Massachusetts rule, a defendant who dies while an appeal is pending has the conviction erased. His lawyers moved on 25 April 2017, and the judge vacated the conviction on 9 May. The Lloyd family had a wrongful-death suit pending against him; their lawyer said the vacated conviction would not affect it. His brain went to Boston University at the family's request, and he was found to have chronic traumatic encephalopathy. On 13 March 2019 the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court reinstated the conviction and ended the abatement rule in the state. The estate had vowed to appeal.

What the law took from it

A defendant's death can change what his estate owes victims, and the rule that decides it can be rewritten after he dies.

Sources
  1. insurancejournal.comPress
  2. Wikipedia (English)Encyclopedia

Cite as: celebrity.estate, “Aaron Hernandez's suicide wiped out his murder conviction, and two years later the state's top court put it back,” story s493, https://www.celebrity.estate/aaron-hernandez-2017, updated 30 October 2026.

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Where this case sits

Music and sportMurder and sudden deathNowNorth AmericaCommon lawUnited States