The little info I have on this one is that she was fatally shot by her son’s friend from an intermediate range. As you can see she tried to defend herself by placing her arm in front of her face. The gunshot hit her arm and her face. Looks like a shotgun wound but I’m not sure, could also be from some other gun and with heavy tattooing.
Fig.1 Woman was shot in the face.
The hallmark of the intermediate range shot is the formation of tattooing or stippling. Tattooing is a vital reaction caused by unburnt powder fragments abrading the skin of the living person. Fine blood spatter may resemble tattooing at first glance; however, tattooing cannot be rubbed off the skin and is a permanent feature at autopsy. Classic tattooing is seen as fine to coarse peppering of the skin with a condensation or concentration of the peppering surrounding the entry defect.
Fig.2 Woman with defense wound on her arm after getting shot in the face.
The color of tattooing ranges from red-brown to orange. Examination under magnification may indeed disclose adherent and embedded propellant particles. The configuration of the propellant granules often aids in the formation of tattooing. For example, fine powder and flake-like granules frequently undergo complete or near complete combustion and are less likely to cause tattooing. However, coarse powder particles (such as the spherical or log configuration) tend to burn incompletely and therefore leave sufficient solid material to impact against the skin at high velocity. In the case of revolvers and semiautomatic pistols, the “rule of thumb” suggests that tattooing should not be expected much beyond a distance of two to three times that of the barrel length.
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