PITTSBURGH -- Forensic testimony continued on Thursday in the wrongful death lawsuit against two state police troopers involved in the fatal shooting of a 12-year-old boy.

Earlier this week, doctors Werner Spitz and Cyril Wecht had two different stories about what happened the day Michael Ellerbe was killed in Uniontown, Fayette County, in December 2002.

On Thursday, Dr. Michael Baden added his testimony, saying that Ellerbe suffered for two minutes after a bullet from Trooper Sam Nassan's gun entered the boy's back and went straight through his torso.

"Collapsed the left lung, pushed the heart all the way over to the right side, squeezing the right lung so it can't get any air," Baden told reporters outside the courthouse. "It's like drowning, because he was trying to breathe and can't breathe. It's very terrifying and painful, both mentally and physically."

Nassan testified at an earlier coroner's inquest that he fired at Ellerbe because he believed the boy shot at his partner, Trooper Juan Curry, while fleeing from a stolen car.

Lawyers for Ellerbe's father, Michael Hickenbottom, are suing Nassan and Curry in federal court.

On Monday, Spitz testified that Ellerbe was shot twice and that both troopers fired at him.

"The location of the wounds and the orientation of the wounds and the appearance of each shot, the appearance of each wound, the intricate structure of the wounds does not allow you to decide that this is all done by one shot," said Spitz.

But Wecht, who performed the autopsy, told the jury that Ellerbe suffered a single gunshot wound to the back.

"If you juxtapose the left arm to the chest, you'll see," Wecht said. "And the other thing is, everybody agrees the boy was shot from the back. Well, if he's shot from the rear, how can bullets strike him in the front of the arm, in the middle of the biceps? It's impossible."

In Wecht's autopsy report, he called the boy's arm wound superficial and said it was more of "an abrasion," not a gunshot wound.

The jury must decide which expert to believe.

The troopers have said that Curry fired a gunshot accidentally while climbing a fence during the chase, and when Nassan heard it, he also fired, thinking his partner had been hit.

Jurors will hear more testimony, trying to determine if Curry and Nassan acted appropriately under the circumstances of the chase.

A coroner's inquest in 2003 cleared the two troopers of any criminal wrongdoing, and the district attorney declined to file charges.

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