5th-grader's death is ruled a suicide; bullying minimized

In the days after Ashlynn's death, her family told police and reporters the Ridge Farm girl had struggled with name-calling by peers for more than a year leading up to her death.

Ashlynn's suicide - one of only a handful by pre-teen children nationwide - became a national story that seemed to illustrate the perils of school bullying. But the more than 100 heavily redacted pages of investigative reports released Monday to the Chicago Tribune tell a more complex story of a sensitive girl with a troubled home life.

Vermilion County Sheriff Pat Hartshorn officially closed his investigation Monday and said he would not pursue criminal charges against anyone in Ashlynn's death. Coroner Peggy Johnson ruled the cause of death suicide by hanging, and would not have hesitated to have listed bullying or harassment as a contributing cause, "but the evidence just was not there."

"I think saying this was caused by bullying (in the media) was premature," Johnson said. "The facts to me are suicide by hanging. There's probably numerous factors - you put them all together. I would not label (the cause) as bullying."

An early report by Vermilion County sheriff's investigators states that Ashlynn's grandmother, who lived with Ashlynn's mother and older sister, grabbed a kitchen knife and had to be restrained from cutting her own wrists when police officers first informed her Ashlynn had died.

Ashlynn's mother, Stacy, told investigators she had attempted suicide as a teenager and again in 2007 when she overdosed on medications and had to have her children call a relative for help.

"In my experience in handling suicides, there's seldom one factor that brings someone to the point that they take their own life," Hartshorn said. "There's usually multiple factors, and I would guess that is the case with Ashlynn."