A superior court judge has ordered the release of Bobbi Kristina Brown's autopsy results. The daughter of Bobby Brown and the late Whitney Houston died in July 2015 at age 22, six months after she was found unconscious and unresponsive in her bathtub in her north Atlanta home. She slipped into a coma and never recovered.
Judge Henry M. Newkirk responded to the motion filed by TEGNA Media, the parent company of Atlanta's WXIA-TV news station, which called for the Superior Court of Fulton County to lift the order sealing Brown's autopsy report and all other documents and reports related to her death.
Prosecutors argued to keep the results sealed because they are part of an ongoing investigation. Judge Newkirk countered that the State had months to file charges.
"We hope to wrap up before too much longer. We are still actively investigating this case. At this point, it is sensitive information that could jeopardize the case," the prosecutor said.
Brown's court-appointed conservator filed a wrongful death lawsuit against Brown's boyfriend Nick Gordon in June, shortly before her death. The suit alleges that Gordon abused his girlfriend and stole "in excess of $11,000 from Brown's bank account while she was in the hospital." It also claims Gordon gave Brown a toxic cocktail and placed her face-down in the bathtub, causing her irreparable brain damage.
Although never officially adopted, Houston raised Gordon like a son, but left nothing for him in her will. Her entire estate was left to Brown, who was set to inherit everything on her 30th birthday. In January 2014, Gordon and Brown announced that they had wed, but her father's lawyer released a statement saying the couple was never married.
Houston died at age 48 in an eerily similar fashion in February 2012 at the Beverly Hilton in Beverly Hills. Brown's mother accidentally drowned in her hotel bathtub on the eve of the 2012 Grammy Awards. The official coroner's reported listed heart disease and cocaine use as contributing factors to her death.
Brown wanted to continue her mother's legacy by launching her own singing career, but she never released any music.
"I have to carry on the legacy," she told Oprah Winfrey in a TV special a month after Houston's death. "We're going to do the singing thing. Some acting, some dancing."
