Journal de recherche médico-légale

Aim: To investigate whether sexual dimorphism can be established by odontometric study of permanent
maxillary canine teeth as well as inter-canine width in north Indian population.
Study design: The study was carried out at department of oral and maxillofacial pathology, King George’s
Medical University, Lucknow, India on students and patients reporting at OPD. Out of total 180 subjects examined 90 subjects were female and 90 were male. Impressions of the upper arch were made using alginate and casts poured in dental stone. The mesiodistal diameter of the crown of permanent maxillary canine both on right and left sides and inter-canine width were measured. From these measurements, maxillary canine index was calculated. The percentage of sexual dimorphism was assessed for all the parameters.
Results: In the present study, the mesiodistal diameter of maxillary canine for both right (p=0.001) and left side (p=0.005) was significantly higher among male subjects than females, Similar observation was found for inter-canine width too (p=0.0001). However, the maxillary canine index for right and left was almost similar (p>0.05) for both male and female subjects.
The sexual dimorphism in right and left mesiodistal diameters of maxillary canine was 4.2% and 3.6%
respectively. For, inter-canine width it was maximum i.e. 13.7%. However, sexual dimorphism in right and left canine index showed negative values i.e. -2.1% and -0.9% respectively.
Conclusion: There was sexual dimorphism in mesiodistal diameter and inter-canine width of permanent
maxillary canine teeth. Sexual dimorphism was more on right permanent maxillary canine teeth than left permanent maxillary canine.

Objective: Age criterion in case of livings plays an important role in clarifying the issues concerning legal
and social aspect. An additional assessment of medial clavicular epiphysis by X-ray or CT examination helps in criminal proceedings to ascertain the age of suspect above 18 years, if skeletal development of hand is complete.
A comparative study was conducted using two radiological techniques i.e. digital Radiography and CT scan to find out the preferred technique for finding the accurate clavicular ossification status for forensic age diagnostics in living subjects above 18 years of age.
Material and method: CT scan images and digital X-rays of a patient population of 100 individuals falling in the age group of 13-30 years (originally preformed for their respective diagnostic purpose) were retrospectively examined for finding the ossification status of clavicle.
Results: It was found that CT scan permitted the evaluation in all the subjects included in the study, but the evaluation was not possible in 6% of the sample with digital X-rays and the results of both modalities were not concordant in 18.5% of the evaluated sample.
Conclusion: It was concluded that CT scan is the better modality for finding the ossification stages of
medial clavicular epiphysis, as the interpretation was easier and the target area could be visualized without the superimposition of other bones in all the cases.

The Temporal bone is a valuable resource to study ear diseases and to teach anatomy to both undergraduate and postgraduate medical students. It is one of the most complicated bones of the skull. Methods of dissecting the middle ear have been described in the text books of Anatomy [1], Pathology and Forensic Medicine [2,3]. Those methods mainly involve the piece meal removal of the bone to expose the tympanic antrum and opening the middle ear cavity which requires a lot of time and expertise. The Present study was conducted on 200 Temporal Bones of 100 unidentified cadavers during Medico-legal Post-mortem Examination. We have devised a new and a very simple method to dissect the temporal bone. Dissection was carried out with the help of a single sharp edged chisel cut named as Cobbler’s Cut that quickly exposes the middle ear cavity and helps in the easily procurement of the ear ossicles (Malleus, Incus & Stapes). It was found to be successful in 86% of the cases for the easy procurement of the complete set of ear ossicles bilaterally. The cadaveric ear ossicles could be of great help for the research purposes in Forensic Medicine and ENT.

In practice of the forensic pathology, many scholars have been keenly aware that the classification of death cause in International Statistical Classification of Diseases (ICD) could not contain and explain the all situations of multiple factors leading to death. Additionally, there remain some viewpoints to be discussed about the traditional rules and method of degree of contribution and manner of death (MOD). To solve the new growing problems in forensic examination and criminal investigation, the quantitative method was introduced into the legal medicine. Firstly, the classification method of death causes was further perfected on the basis of the traditional theory in WHOICD (10). And all factors related to death had been divided into eight kinds of death causes and given the definitions and degrees of contribution, according to their quantitative effects in death mechanism. Moreover, authors suggested that the more accurate definition of MOD based on above principle should be adopted for the determination of MOD conveniently. Years of our successful experiences, especially for the cases involved in the multiple factors, have shown that the principle should be considered as the scientific basis to comprehend correctly the causality of the factors related to death, and to provide the more scientific and quantitative evidences for the court trial and civil compensation.

Forensic analysis of DNA from non-human bones can be important in investigating a variety of forensic cases. However, decomposed bone is difficult to process for isolating DNA. In this study, a previously established enzymatic method was utilized to process bone samples that simulate decomposed specimens. Our results demonstrated that this enzymatic processing method is effective for removing decomposed soft tissues and outer surface materials such as mineralized bone connective tissue of bone fragment samples. Our data suggested that this method can be used in the initial sample preparation for cleaning the outer surface of decomposed non-human skeletal fragments. This study introduced an alternative method for processing decomposed non-human bone evidence prior to DNA isolation. Such a method can potentially be used to process various samples of different sizes and conditions for the investigation of a wide variety of criminal cases involving animals.

Engagement is seen as an important part of successful treatment in severe mental illness, however, it is often not well defined as a concept. A number of attempts have been made to clarify this definition and psychometric measures have been developed to assess engagement. This commentary discusses issues related to engagement with mental health services and its application to prisoners with severe mental illness returning to the community

This paper presents the basic problems and difficulties that can be found when working with isolated populations as far as propose some approaches in the analysis of this type of populations. 13 autosomal STRs have been analyzed and statistical forensic parameters, such as observed heterozygosity and power of discrimination have been determined, in samples from isolated and non-isolated populations. Samples were amplified with AmpFlSTR®Identifiler® kit (Applied Biosystems) and PowerPlex 16®kit (Promega). For DNA typing, an ABI PRISM 310 Genetic Analyzer was used, and the analysis was performed with GeneMapper ID-X Software v1.1. PowerStats software and SPSS v15.0 were used to calculate forensic and other parameters.The analysis is based on the comparison of three main population groups (large, medium, and small), and an estimation of the forensic parameters, such as discrimination power (PD), observed heterozygosity (Ho), and combined PD, was obtained.The obtained results reveal that heterozygosity and PD are lower in aboriginal populations than in other populations. This research contributes to defining the decrease in allele presence caused by the lower size of a population as far as endogamy processes.To obtain an efficient human identification, it is necessary to generate independent databases for all the different populations, including small isolated groups. Action protocols to these kinds of populations have to be adapted: type as many markers as possible, not only autosomal STR but also mitochondrial DNA and sexual chromosome markers and characterize those one that better describe the population, and also get genetic information of close relatives as far as direct references of the individual.

Clinical analytical toxicology is one of the most essential parts in treatment of patients poisoned with drugs or toxic chemicals in hospitals. National Forensic Science Laboratory (NAFOL) has been providing clinical toxicology analytical services since its inception in 1999. NAFOL received over 182 cases in Fiscal Year 2011/2012 which is a far cry from two cases it started with in 1999. This study aims to analyze the data compiled from last 12 years (Fiscal Year 2000/2001 to 2011/2012) on different nature of poisons found in clinical toxicological cases. NAFOL analyzed total of 1699 toxicological cases it received from 22 different hospitals among which 1016 (60%) cases were of clinical toxicology. Out of 1016 clinical toxicological cases, 479 cases (47%) were negative and 537 cases (53%) were positive. Types of poisons used in the 537 positive cases are insecticide (34%), drugs (11%), rodenticide (4%) and other miscellaneous (4%). Nuvan is the most common insecticide used as poison. The laboratory is facing the problems in providing clinical toxicology services due to inadequate information about the case history and lack of awareness in sample collections. It is expected that the study will help clinicians treat patients poisoned with drugs or toxic chemicals in the hospitals better.

The allele frequency of 15 Short tandem repeat (STRs) loci of the Buganda population-Central Uganda was determined in 221 unrelated individuals from the randomly selected 10 districts of the Buganda region. The DNA samples were extracted following Chelex extraction protocol, amplified using the AmpFlSTR® Identifiler Plus™ PCR amplification kit, and separated using capillary electrophoresis on an ABI 3130xl Genetic Analyzer. All loci were in Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium expectations and the Buganda population is heterozygous. When combined, combined power of exclusion (CPE), combined match probability (CMP) and combined power of discrimination (CPD) were 0.99981, 1 in 2.471×1017 and 0.999999998 respectively an indication that the loci are highly informative, polymorphic and discriminative useful in paternity and forensic testing in the Buganda population.

Hair is the most frequently found trace evidence in the crime cases. It assists in establishing a triangular relation between a crime scene, a victim and a criminal. Morphology of hair can be helpful in forensic investigations to distinguish hair from one race to another. In this context for the purpose of analysis, cuticle inner margin (distinct or not distinct), cuticle thickness and ovoid bodies (present or absent) were considered. Four different castes (Awan, Butt, Gujjar and Rajput) were selected to analyze the structural similarity and differences from each other. Compound microscope was used for purpose of observation. There was no significant gender based difference among all castes. But significant differences were found among individuals of different castes. The purpose of this study was to develop a data base by analyzing the cuticle thickness, inner cuticle margin and ovoid bodies in human head hair in different races of Pakistan to narrow down forensic analysis in criminal scene investigation.