Journal de médecine légale

Africans, especially Ghanaians, do rely on media reportage than autopsy or police findings in alleged murder or homicide cases. An autopsy finding has numerous benefits of which finding the actual cause of death is paramount. However, most findings are met with public displeasure especially when it is not in line with media reports made earlier. The study review such incidence of which the deceased was reported to have been beaten and dragged on the street which resulted in his demise. Some media reports claimed that the deceased sustained multiple Taser bodily burns and other injuries which include rib fractures, head injury and bodily lacerations at time of reportage. The autopsy findings were polar to the media report. The immediate cause of death was congestive heart failure which was triggered by asymptomatic chronic massive congestion and enlargement of the liver, lungs and the spleen (mechanism of death). The inveterate nature of these condition rules out all suspected foul play or assault. The absence of external or internal marks of violence further validate that the death was natural and not homicide.

DNA testing technology has rapidly advanced and is now so sensitive that it brings with it a risk of contamination, which could potentially lead to a miscarriage of justice. I reviewed environmental monitoring data from six SARCS (Sexual Assault Referral Centres) in the UK between 2013 and 2015 to assess contamination levels in the UK in line with new guidelines produced by the Forensic Regulator for the UK.

For the forensic DNA testing, we must often perform DNA analysis from a very small amount of samples with poor quality. As a result, it becomes often non-testable without succeeding in PCR. To overcome this problem, we looking for a trace element with catalytic effect for PCR. 13 kinds of the following element were examined, Si, Pb, V, Zn, Cu, Cd, Ca, Bi, Tl, Sn, Hg, Se. As. The concentration of trace element to final PCR solution was in the range of 1 ppb~10 ppm, respectively, and compared it with the additive-free control PCR. We showed an acceleration effect of the PCR to vanadium and copper. The addition of vanadium and copper showed the highest acceleration effect by the concentration of 10 ppm from 1 ppm in final mixture. The combination of vanadium 10 ppm and copper 1 ppm was highest rate of detection using PPY23 for personal identification, and showed the amplification was accelerate at least 4 cycles (equivalent to 32 times increase in quantity) rather than control PCR.

In forensic practice intracranial hemorrhages are usually seen in cases of trauma but non traumatic, acute bilateral intraventricular hemorrhage that is in the young pregnant female is very rare and such cases come across by a forensic pathologist is still rarer. Here we present one such case of sudden natural death of fatal isolated pan intraventricular hemorrhage. The deceased was primigravida woman with 20 weeks of gestation, who was subjected to autopsy at the Department of Forensic Medicine, in our college with alleged history of domestic violence with her husband as complained by deceased’s parents and brother; she was married one year back.

Flunitrazepam (FNZ) is a short-intermediate acting benzodiazepine derivative, and easily reduced to 7-amino FNZ. We autopsied the buried cadaver of homicide victim two years after the strangulation following ingestion of FNZ. The whole body of the cadaver had become moderately decomposed and adipocere without any obvious dehiscence. There was a fracture of the lamina thyroid cartilage. Gas chromatography/mass spectrometry (GC/MS) was performed on bone marrow sample and the stomach contents. Only 7-amino FNZ could be detected in the stomach contents. The detection of 7-amino FNZ brought important information about the ante-mortem circumstances. To our knowledge, such detection of FNZ product in a cadaver after a long period of time has not been reported previously.

Sexual homicide is a distinctive form of homicide and an extreme form of sexual violence. This phenomenon has been well addressed in psychiatric, psychological and forensic literatures. Nevertheless, sometimes it is difficult to understand the motivations behind a sexual homicide mainly when it occurs within the closed family environment.

We report two cases of women’s sexual homicide committed by a family member, other than a sexual partner or an ex-partner. The sexual character was confirmed by laboratory evidences which also allowed the offender identification. In both cases, the offenders did not have any history of violence conviction and were not under substance abuse influence. In addition, psychological autopsy has not revealed any psychiatric disorder of the offenders.

In this paper, we describe the findings, we discuss the characteristics of this type of murder and its motivation factors related to our socio-cultural and legislative context.