Death Trap by M. William Phelps Page B

the shrinkage of tissue. In homicide investigation this posture the body holds is sometimes mistaken for what is a “predeath attempt to shield oneself from an attacker.”
    Podjaski noted that Alan’s right forearm was burned away approximately 5 inches distal to the elbow. The lower extremities are contracted at the knees and ankles, with almost complete disarticulation at the knee and ankle joints.
    To look at a body that has been burned grotesquely in a fire is a ghastly reminder that the body is made up mostly of fat and muscle tissue, which burns fast and ferocious when subjected to an intense flame—much like the bristle on a steak flaring up on the grill.
    “The charring of the soft tissues,” the doctor said later, referring once again to Alan’s body, “is most severe on the anterior portion of the face and the right side of the head.”
    Any exposed section of Alan’s face, in other words, had been burned almost completely off.
    One of Terra’s extremities (arms) was partially burned, the other totally, completely burned away, the doctor wrote. Her skin is completely burned away with some charred muscles and soft tissues.
    The doctor opened both bodies and removed the organs, one by one. Whenever he came across what he believed to be a wound of some sort, he used metal rods, or “probes,” to figure out the trajectory any possible projectiles could have taken, pointing out a possible cause and direction for the wounds. Because the bodies were so badly burned, however, it was difficult for the doctor to figure out if he was looking at exit or entrance wounds. To find this out would take further examination.
    With Terra, the doctor was certain the wounds on her back were “consistent with exit as opposed to entrance [wounds],” he said.
    There was a second bullet wound, a “little bit closer to what we describe as axilla,” or the armpit, directly underneath the position in the body where the arm connects to the shoulder socket.
    Terra was shot, it appeared, as she lifted up her arm, probably as she instinctively defended herself. This was likely the first shot. A victim cannot necessarily put up her hands to shield herself if she has been shot anywhere else.
    A third wound the doctor found was located in Terra’s chest. A fourth in the “flank,” or near the belly area on the side near the hip.
    From the evidence available and the way in which the probes projected various trajectory patterns, it appeared to the doctor that Terra was shot four times, each hitting a different area of her body as she instinctively protected herself and fell to the ground. Terra’s killer approached her with a weapon, began firing and didn’t stop.
    The poor woman never had a chance.
    But then something odd stood out to the doctor—something quite significant. On both bodies there was an irregular, elongated area of the back side detailing a particular region of “dark discoloration.” In the doctor’s humble opinion, this subtle wound marking meant that the body was likely “pressed against something” when the bullet exited the body.
    This was new information. Probably important, too.
    “Maybe that person was sitting,” the doctor explained. “I’m not sure. But there was something behind. That bullet exiting [the body] pressed the skin, and the skin hit that object and that caused [the] contusion.”
    The exit wounds the doctor referred to didn’t have that familiar “blowout” starfish pattern of torn skin the doctor knew to be consistent with this type of exit bullet wound. Something was firmly pressed up against that area of the skin as the bullet passed through. This finding was common in the bodies of men executed by firing squad: because they were backed up to a wall and shot. The bullets had an extra layer of material to go through, allowing for the exit wound of the body to be clean.
    In the end the doctor signed off on both deaths as homicide. Cause of death was determined to be multiple