USA. A 35-year-old male was found dead in the basement room where he slept, which also served as his firearm storage room. He reportedly slept in the room because he and his wife were in the process of divorcing. The wife reported that she and her husband had argued while in the same room. During the argument, she reportedly “thumped him on the head” because of something he said. He then produced a handgun and fired multiple shots, with one striking the door of the room and one striking her in the arm. She claimed that she then passed out, and was eventually awakened when she heard another gunshot. Upon awakening, she found her husband’s body lying supine on his mattress, which was on the floor, with a gun in his dominant right hand and blood on his head/ face.
Fig.1 The male decedent, lying supine on a mattress in his gun room.
Fig.2 Another view of the decedent.
A subsequent medicolegal autopsy revealed a gunshot entrance wound of the left cheek, in front of the ear, with gunpowder stippling in a roughly oval-shaped area in front of, above, and behind the entrance wound, involving the nose, face, and ear. There was no identifiable soot. The projectile perforated the left skull, the left temporal lobe, the central basilar skull, the right temporal lobe, and the right temporal skull. Fragments were recovered from within the brain and the right scalp. The pathway of the bullet was from left to right, slightly from front to back, and slightly upward. The cause of death was “gunshot wound of the head.”
Fig.3 A bullet defect on the door of the gun room.
Fig.4 A scene photograph with arrows indicating debris from the gunshot that perforated the edge of the door.
Measurements of the decedent’s arm length were taken at autopsy. Test-firing of the weapon revealed that the muzzle of the firearm was approximately 46 cm (18 inches) from the left side of the decedent’s face when it was fired. Using a toy gun and using an assistant with similar body build, size, and arm length, the following conclusions were determined: In order for the decedent to have shot himself and produce the stippling pattern present evident at autopsy, he would have had to hold the weapon with his non-dominant left hand (contrary to the wife’s description), using an unconventional grip. In contrast, using the right hand, it was not possible to hold the gun far enough from the face to pro- duce a muzzle-to-target distance of 45 cm (18 inches). Additionally, scene and ballistics investigation showed that multiple rounds had been fired from multiple weapons.
Fig.5 A close-up view of the pool of blood that was adjacent to the decedent and mattress, with arrows indicating debris from the door lying on top of the blood.
Fig.6 An autopsy photograph of the decedent showing an intermediate range gunshot entrance wound just in front of the left ear.
Most importantly, a review of scene photographs revealed that fragments of the door were present on top of the victim’s body and on top of pools of partially dried blood at the scene, indicating that the shot through the door occurred after the husband was dead, not before as the wife had stated. Based on the contradictory autopsy and scene findings, the manner of death was ruled a homicide. The wife later confessed to having killed her husband and staging the scene to correlate with her false statements regarding the sequence of events.
Fig.7 Another piece of door debris found on top of the decedent.
Latest posts
