Autopsy: Man's November death from overdose

Though a final autopsy report determined a 32-year-old Odessa man’s cause of death to be a drug overdose, authorities said his death is still being investigated as a homicide.

Cody Wayne Mercer’s cause of death was determined to be methamphetamine intoxication, an Ector County Sheriff’s Office release stated.

Mercer’s body was found Nov. 1 with bruising and scratches on his head in a bar ditch on FM 554, two and a half miles north of East Loop 338, the release stated. He was found wearing nothing but socks, the release stated.

“We still don’t have the manner in which his death happened, whether it was self-done or not,” Sheriff Mark Donaldson said. “Either way, someone left him on the side of the road with no clothes on, and that lends me to believe there’s more to his death.”

An ECSO news release from November stated autopsy reports found Mercer had no internal trauma and no notable natural disease.

Donaldson said names and descriptions of possible suspects in Mercer’s death have not been released.

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