Cardiac Ventricular Laceration Due to Child Abuse: Abusive Ventricular Laceration

Traumatic cardiac ventricular ruptures in children are rare. Only a single case of left ventricular rupture due to child abuse has been reported. We report a child who sustained a fatal left ventricular apical rupture. It appeared to have resulted from hydrostatic forces resulting from abusive blunt thoracic injury. That he was being abused was previously missed when he was presented to the emergency department with facial pyoderma. It was not noted that he also had lip and oral mucosal injury, sites not affected by staph toxins. As a result, his underlying, abusive and secondarily infected, facial flow type scald burn was not appreciated. Within a week thereafter his fatal injury occurred, accompanied by extensive and obvious associated abusive injuries. Postmortem high‐detail whole body computed tomography scanning aided the autopsy. Although rare, ventricular rupture from abusive blunt thoracic injury can occur.     

Reanalysis of the Trotter Tibia Quandary and its Continued Effect on Stature Estimation of Past‐Conflict Service Members

Forensic casework from past‐conflicts relies on the corrected historical Trotter data for stature estimation in Fordisc. For roughly 10 years’, stature estimation using this data has produced point estimates for the tibia that are on average 1.25 inches less than the other long bones. This issue was identified after applying the equations derived from Fordisc to the USS Oklahoma commingled assemblage. Reevaluation of Fordisc revealed that a correction factor of 20 mm, instead of 10 mm, was mistakenly applied to the Trotter tibia data. Historical forensic anthropology reports written at the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency were utilized to identify that the overcorrection is isolated to Fordisc 3 with an error rate of 5% of known antemortem statures falling outside of the prediction intervals that relied on the tibia. Further evaluation of the Oklahoma sample indicates the 10 mm correction is still producing point estimates less than the other long bones.     

Surveillance of environmental movements in Canada: critical infrastructure protection and the petro-security apparatus

A convergence of post-9/11 security governance practices and a dependence on extractive economies has resulted in changes to the way Canadian policing agencies classify environmental movements. We detail how the category of ‘critical infrastructure protection’ (CIP) now enables surveillance of environmentalists under the banner of national security. We examine the growth of CIP as a security category, its changing character from the Cold War to the present, and the role of threat entrepreneurs. We demonstrate that CIP networks have institutionalized collaborations between national security agencies and energy corporations, creating a petro-security apparatus that aims to suppress dissent. We conclude with reflections on what surveillance regimes driven by the petro-security apparatus mean for debates about national security and social movements.     

Conducting Veteran Dependency and Indemnity Compensation Exams: Establishing a Nexus Between Mental Health and Death

Forms of financial compensation have been paid to the beneficiaries of deceased service members since the Revolutionary War. In its current version, Dependency and Indemnity Compensation (DIC) is a tax-free monetary benefit paid to eligible survivors of veterans whose death resulted from a service-related disability. Mental health professionals are called upon to provide medico-legal opinions in DIC claims involving questions of whether a veteran’s service-connected mental illness contributed substantially to their death. The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) does not currently employ training programs, competency standards, or best practice recommendations for these specialized evaluations. This article seeks to fill this gap and provide a resource for mental health professionals providing medical opinions in DIC claims.     

Mitochondrial DNA sequencing of cat hair: an informative forensic tool

Approximately 81.7 million cats are in 37.5 million U.S. households. Shed fur can be criminal evidence because of transfer to victims, suspects, and/or their belongings. To improve cat hairs as forensic evidence, the mtDNA control region from single hairs, with and without root tags, was sequenced. A dataset of a 402-bp control region segment from 174 random-bred cats representing four U.S. geographic areas was generated to determine the informativeness of the mtDNA region. Thirty-two mtDNA mitotypes were observed ranging in frequencies from 0.6-27%. Four common types occurred in all populations. Low heteroplasmy, 1.7%, was determined. Unique mitotypes were found in 18 individuals, 10.3% of the population studied. The calculated discrimination power implied that 8.3 of 10 randomly selected individuals can be excluded by this region. The genetic characteristics of the region and the generated dataset support the use of this cat mtDNA region in forensic applications.     

Intravascular bullet embolism to the right atrium

Bullet embolism is a relatively unusual complication of gunshot wounds. Embolism to the right atrium comprises <5% of all reported intravascular bullet emboli. We report an additional case of bullet embolus to the right atrium of a 0.38-caliber bullet following a gunshot wound to the chest. The intracardiac bullet was recognized radiologically on presentation, but the patient was hemodynamically stable and managed conservatively, with the bullet left in place. The missile remained within the heart without clinical significance for several years and was recovered from the right atrium only at the time of autopsy. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first documented case of a 0.38-caliber bullet which embolized to the right atrium and remained inconsequential for an extended period of time.     

Sexual Dimorphism of Anterior Sacral Curvature

Abstract: This study assesses the predictive value of anterior sacral curvature for sex estimation from skeletonized remains. Sacra from a sample of 125 American adults of known age and sex were examined. Nine measurements describing anterior sacral curvature were used in the analysis. Statistical treatment of the data included univariate statistics and discriminant function analysis for sex classification. A bootstrap validation method was employed to assess the classification error rates. Sacral curvature was significantly greater in men than in women at the level of the S2–S3 and S3–S4 articulations (p < 0.05). Correct classification estimates for the discriminant function range from 66–72%. Although sexually dimorphic, metric observations of sacral curvature are not as reliable at predicting sex as other skeletal elements. Anterior sacral curvature should only be used for sex estimation in the absence of other, more reliable, indicators.     

Suicide by asphyxiation due to helium inhalation

Suicide by asphyxiation using helium is the most widely-promoted method of "self-deliverance" by right-to-die advocates. However, little is known about persons committing such suicides or the circumstances and manner in which they are completed. Prior reports of suicides by asphyxiation involving helium were reviewed and deaths determined by the North Carolina Office of the Chief Medical Examiner to be helium-associated asphyxial suicides occurring between January 1, 2000 and December 31, 2008 were included in a new case series examined in this article. The 10 asphyxial suicides involving helium identified in North Carolina tended to occur almost exclusively in non-Hispanic, white men who were relatively young (M age = 41.1 T 11.6). In 6 of 10 cases, decedents suffered from significant psychiatric dysfunction; in 3 of these 6 cases, psychiatric disorders were present comorbidly with substance abuse. In none of these cases were decedents suffering from terminal illness. Most persons committing suicide with helium were free of terminal illness but suffered from psychiatric and/or substance use disorders.