CTE or chronic traumatic encephalopathy  affects many individuals including a number of NFL players.  According to a study at Boston University, “researcher Dr. Ann McKee examined the brains of 202 deceased football players and found that 110 of the 111 brains of former NFL players had chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE). The results were published in the Journal of the American Medical Association.Jul 25, 2017″ Aaron Hernandez, who was convicted of the 2013 murder of Odin Lloyd, committed suicide on April 19th, 2017 and was found to have suffered from CTE. The recent release of his autopsy report last month shows that there may be previously-undetected influences on Hernandez’s aggressive behavior and actions up to the end.

The autopsy report revealed that Hernandez suffered from stage three (of four) chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE). CTE generally starts to show symptoms around a person’s 20s or 30s. Aaron Hernandez, who committed suicide at the age of 27, had been repeatedly reported to show aggressive behavior. Hernandez had been playing football since high school, branching off into college and later in the NFL for three seasons. Commonly, CTE shows itself as depression, aggression, and shares traits with dementia and So far, CTE can only be detected post-mortem, but scientists are working on finding a way to detect it in the living.

CTE is commonly caused by repeated head trauma, and sports like football go hand in hand with head trauma. Hernandez played tight end, which is an offensive position that mainly blocks the opposing team from getting to the quarterback or running back. Blocking can frequently lead to intense collisions, and in turn head trauma. Despite this, officials report that Hernandez had only one documented concussion (out of twenty-six documented injuries) while playing for the NFL and no documented concussions while playing in college. His concussion on the NFL did not require him to sit out of practices.

The autopsy report was released due to its relevance in the court case of the NFL and Hernandez’s daughter, Avielle Janelle Hernandez.