295
FORENSIC MEDICINE UNIT
DEPARTMENT OF MORBID ANATOMY
ST. THOMAS HOSPITAL MEDICAL SCHOOL
LONDON SE1 7EH
PROPR9SOF+#+OPEN©ER
H.R.M. JOHNSON
3
TELEPHONE 01 928 9292
EXT. 2702 2670
examination appear to be fair.
Like all the three pathologists mentioned above I would agree that a figure of blood alcohol of 52mg% is unlikely to impair the mental or physical faculties of an adult male of the deceased's build with experience of drinking alcohol.
As to the possibility of judging whether the deceased was a practicing homesexual; all one can say is that the description given in the post mortem report by Dr. Wong and the photograph in the album suggest that the deceased had been and possibly still was a practicing homosexual but beyond that I am not prepared to
As to the evidence of Mr. Cimino, I am not a ballistics expert and I would prefer that a ballistics expert from the Home Office give his opinion. It should be possible by examining the clothing removed from the deceased at the flat when his body was first examined and the revolver concerned and the bullets recovered for a ballistics expert te judge the range at which the revolver was fired, which from the descriptions given in the documents referred to above appears to be in contact with the clothing worn by the deceased.
From a medical point of view there is nothing inconsistent with the views expressed by the three pathologists that the wounds on MACLENNAN's body were self inflicted.
1. They are in a site of election, that is a site chosen by a would-be suicide, in
the chest.
2. They appear to be contact wounds.
3. The wounds numbered 3 and 4 in the photographs appear to overlap which would be
more against them being fired by an assailant from a distance than by the deceased holding the gun against his chest and repeatedly pressing the trigger.
The overall circumstances of the death in the flat, for example the locked doors, the inaccessible windows, the suicide note in the deceased's handwriting etc.
5. There was only one serious disabling wound likely to cause rapid death and that
is the wound labelled number 1 which might cause death in approximately 2 minutes.
If one compares cases where there are multiple stab wounds which have been inflicted either by the victim or by an assailant, or bullet wounds fired by an assailant which have penetrated the heart and aorta, it is not generally realised that death is not instantaneous but that quite considerable physical activity can be undertaken. This is particularly so when the victim is unaware in a stabbing, that he has in fact been stabbed. I personally have seen a case where there were 13 self inflicted stab wounds, 6 of which went through the heart, and another case of a man stabbed three times in the heart and aorta who climbed a flight of stairs to get a weapon and then came down and grappled with an assailant before collapsing and dying from less of blood. I am fully aware that many of my colleagues in forensic pathology have similar cases they could quete.
Cont.over/......