
A man was found dead Monday in an apparent suicide outside a store in the Shady Acres community, Houston police said.
Police only identified the man as Hispanic. The Harris County Institute of Forensic Sciences will determine his identity and official cause of death.
The man's body was found hanged outside the store at 9:05 a.m. in the 2500 block of Ella Boulevard, south of Interstate 610 North, police said. A video circulating on social media apparently shows a man hanging from a tree in a field at that location. A group of emergency vehicles, including a Houston police car, was on the scene.
The video triggered widespread speculation that the man seen in the video was black. There have been two other recent incidents in California where black men were found hanged in public, one in the city of Palmdale and the other in Victorville.
Houston police homicide detectives are currently investigating the death in Houston, but they do not suspect foul play, police said. Houston Police Chief Art Acevedo said that the man's family members indicated he was suicidal.
No other details were available Monday afternoon.