CORONER RULES DEATH OF HERNANDEZ A SUICIDE

The death of former New England Patriots tight end Aaron Hernandez was ruled a suicide, the Worcester County (Mass.) District Attorney’s Office announced Thursday. Hernandez was found hanged by a bedsheet inside his cell at the Souza Baranowski Correctional Center in Shirley, Mass., early Wednesday morning and was pronounced dead at a hospital about an hour later. The Massachusetts chief medical examiner, Henry N. Nields, concluded the “manner of death was suicide and the cause asphyxia by hanging,” according to a news release. “There were no signs of a struggle, and investigators determined that Mr. Hernandez was alone at the time of the hanging,” the district attorney’s office said in the statement.