Hidden facts about death: A homicide due to combination of asphyxia and head injury

Police, few times, refers the medicolegal cases for autopsy, with inadequate inquest and with facts being concealed by the relatives to hide the crime. Multi-factorial homicide in an elderly woman by combination of asphyxia and head injury is an uncommon incident. We report an unusual case of a sixty-five-year-old woman who was brought dead to the hospital as a case of unknown bite. On autopsy, we observed the features of death by asphyxia due to combination of smothering and throttling, with head injury as a contributory cause. Initially we informed the Police about possible cause and manner of death. We reconstructed the proper sequence of events of the crime after meticulous autopsy, crime scene visit and inquiry of the suspect by the Police.

Investigating officers should be regularly trained to identify such cases for preparing a proper inquest.