Document Detail


Shooting through clothing in firearm suicides.
MedLine Citation:
PMID:  20202064     Owner:  NLM     Status:  MEDLINE    
Abstract/OtherAbstract:
There is a longstanding empirical rule that people who commit suicide rarely shoot through their clothing, but rather put it aside to expose the nude skin. Signs of shots through clothing have always been considered suspicious, raising presumptions of the presence of an abettor. Our report, based on a retrospective study of fatal suicidal firearm injuries from the years 1980 to 2007, points out that suicide victims only rarely remove clothing from the site of the future entry wound. The report covered 43 cases with fatal gunshot wounds in the area of the thorax, with only four persons (9%) removing the clothing present in the area of the subsequent self-inflicted wound. Defects present on the clothing of a victim cannot, therefore, be understood as an absolute criterion for disproving the possibility of suicide, and nor do they necessarily indicate an unfortunate accident or homicide. If, however, the suicide victim removes the clothing from the area of the future wound, then this is almost always an indication of suicide.
Authors:
Petr Hejna; Miroslav Safr
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Publication Detail:
Type:  Journal Article     Date:  2010-02-25
Journal Detail:
Title:  Journal of forensic sciences     Volume:  55     ISSN:  1556-4029     ISO Abbreviation:  J. Forensic Sci.     Publication Date:  2010 May 
Date Detail:
Created Date:  2010-06-10     Completed Date:  2010-09-28     Revised Date:  -    
Medline Journal Info:
Nlm Unique ID:  0375370     Medline TA:  J Forensic Sci     Country:  United States    
Other Details:
Languages:  eng     Pagination:  652-4     Citation Subset:  IM    
Affiliation:
Institute of Legal Medicine, Charles University, Prague, Czech Republic. hejnap@lfhk.cuni.cz
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MeSH Terms
Descriptor/Qualifier:
Central Nervous System Depressants / blood
Clothing*
Ethanol / blood
Female
Firearms
Forensic Pathology
Humans
Male
Middle Aged
Suicide*
Thoracic Injuries / pathology
Wounds, Gunshot / pathology*
Chemical
Reg. No./Substance:
0/Central Nervous System Depressants; 64-17-5/Ethanol

From MEDLINE®/PubMed®, a database of the U.S. National Library of Medicine


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