Autopsy

[scandi]

Very Good Close and thank you.

I think that wherever there were abrasions these were the 'secondary' or ansillary marks made by whatever weapon was used by the killer. Kind of like a rope burn would make, turn red and maybe get a bit puffy.

If your arm was hit by this mag flashlight, the force of the edge of the rim of it would cause the crescent or jagged laceration {depending on the angle and how it landed on the skin},and the red marks the ME drew in the diagram acc to Baden were these stridations that were on the weapon and made an imprint in the skin when the blow was struck.

You'd think they could find a weapon to match those injuries to her body, and I bet they know just what it was. Unfortunately, like Charlie says, it might be out by Duffield hiding in some obscure place.

 

[Taximom]

The phrase "teeth from near victim's head" means to me that she must have been hit hard while she was down, and didn't move after that. IMO, of course.

As with Laci, I can't even imagine what her last moments must have been like. Michelle may have been terrified that Cassidy might have been next.

 

[Samiya]

I hope someone here can expound on all this info. Like when she was found she was laying pretty much face down but the blood pooled in the posterier part of her body. That is confusing to me.

xoxoxo Scandi

I'm doing this bit by bit, as easy as possible.

Absence of Rigor Mortis and 'shift' in Livor Mortis.

The absence of Rigor in the AR means that the process of Rigor Mortis was complete by the time of beginning the autopsy. It is not favoured to force body positions while in RM at any stage as breakages of bones can and do occur. Those breakages could possibly interfere with any bodily injuries sustained during an attack on a victim and would have to be noted in the AR. Practices such as 'straightening' have in the past caused further stress and upset to family members, when it could have been avoided by waiting for the process of Rigor Mortis to complete.

Posterior Livor. (For you Scandi)

The shifting of Anterior Livor to Posterior Livor is due to moving, transporting and maintaining the body's position from face down to face up. Note that for Livor to 'shift' from Anterior to Posterior, then Livor was not 'fixed' at the time of movement of the body.....

'Not fixed' usually means that the body wasn't in one position for 8 hours straight.

Unfortunately this is all I have time for at the moment but when I come back in a few hours, I will start analysing the attempted strangulation.

Sami

 

[close_enough]

Very Good Close and thank you.

I think that wherever there were abrasions these were the 'secondary' or ansillary marks made by whatever weapon was used by the killer. Kind of like a rope burn would make, turn red and maybe get a bit puffy.

If your arm was hit by this mag flashlight, the force of the edge of the rim of it would cause the crescent or jagged laceration {depending on the angle and how it landed on the skin},and the red marks the ME drew in the diagram acc to Baden were these stridations that were on the weapon and made an imprint in the skin when the blow was struck.

You'd think they could find a weapon to match those injuries to her body, and I bet they know just what it was. Unfortunately, like Charlie says, it might be out by Duffield hiding in some obscure place.

yeah, i was just looking at fireplace tools....heck, a lot of them; the entire set weighs like 15 lbs, so a poker/blow poke wouldn't necessarily weigh all that much......

i understand what you're saying.....so much bruising on her hands & then the one tiny laceration on the left thumb, & an abrasion on the right wrist....just has me wondering if MAYBE that was the 'arm/length' of some kind of poker/blow poke that was hitting her at that point while she was trying to cover her head......i just don't know, just not sure...Baden was apparently looking at the same thing we're looking at...the autopsy "report", not actual pictures of the wounds....hmmmmm

oh yeah, i feel sure that LE has a good idea, if not positive, what the weapon was.....lol, had to laugh at it being in Duffield though, but hey, it's sure possible!!!!

 

[scandi]

Thank you Sami. You are such a luv!~

I think what you are saying is that the body was originally face up {even though her head might have been facing a direction to expose the left side of it as up}, and since livor mortis happens before rigor mortis has really taken much hold on the body, if the body were to say be rolled over to a face down position, the blood that had congealed in the posterior part of the body would stay there, and not run down to the anterior parts, now on the bottom. Sorry for that looooong sentence!

That certainly does make sense to me. So after he got Cassidy calmed down and took a shower, he returned to the body and saw her staring up at the ceiling and couldn't handle it. So he rolled her over, not carefully to make sure she was alligned straight, and then picked up the pillow and tossed it to cover her head. It was like his final salute to her, "Here you go babe, this is what you get". And then he couldn't see her head and it seemed to lessen what he had done to her - in some way.

And that might be why once her body was in full rigor it could not be rolled over without breaking a joint or a bone. She might have been pulled by her arm to roll her over, so her hips would not be squarely on their side, but a bit to the back because of her feet holding the hips back a bit. And then from the waist up, if one of her arms was trapped behind her back, away from the direction of the roll, it would place her body in an unusual and very angulated position from which she would be very hard to turn over when in full rigor.

Cripes sake, I really don't have any idea. One thing though, with this scenario, it does tell us that the murderer stuck around for a bit doing something else. There was time for the blood to pool in the lowest part of the body. Time. He might not have been in any hurry, especially if it was his own house!

Isn't this guy a piece of work to do this. Unbelievable what was done to Michelle. I do know that this crime will be vindicated. She might have had her faults - we all do, but her good karma, and that of little Cassidy being put into such a precarious position in her young life ~ that karma will shine through. The killer will be named and pay the price.

 

[scandi]

You bet Close, and it could even be in the deep area of that lake close to their house.

Oh, the more I learn the more I need to know! I am so bad LOL

We have to keep it simple, right. That's the only way to figure it out.
For one thing Close, I think all of those crescently shaped jagged wounds all look like they were made by the same weapon - back of her head, left side of her face. There was only one device used to hurt her besides his hands IMHO.

I wish I could figure out which wounds took place in what order. I'm hoping to find out that the first few wounds damaged her brain so that she really didn't feel pain, just the shock of it.

And I don't see any major wound at the base of her brain where the skull was open and showed the brain as was stated in the AR. I don't see the drawing for this at the base of her brain. The wound to the neck is too low below the skull. It must have been by her ear. I give up!

 

[close_enough]

You bet Close, and it could even be in the deep area of that lake close to their house.

Oh, the more I learn the more I need to know! I am so bad LOL

We have to keep it simple, right. That's the only way to figure it out.
For one thing Close, I think all of those crescently shaped jagged wounds all look like they were made by the same weapon - back of her head, left side of her face. There was only one device used to hurt her besides his hands IMHO.

I wish I could figure out which wounds took place in what order. I'm hoping to find out that the first few wounds damaged her brain so that she really didn't feel pain, just the shock of it.

And I don't see any major wound at the base of her brain where the skull was open and showed the brain as was stated in the AR. I don't see the drawing for this at the base of her brain. The wound to the neck is too low below the skull. It must have been by her ear. I give up!

lol...you're not the only one Scandi....this autopsy just got me wanting MORE info!!!!!

 

[close_enough]

You bet Close, and it could even be in the deep area of that lake close to their house.

Oh, the more I learn the more I need to know! I am so bad LOL

We have to keep it simple, right. That's the only way to figure it out.
For one thing Close, I think all of those crescently shaped jagged wounds all look like they were made by the same weapon - back of her head, left side of her face. There was only one device used to hurt her besides his hands IMHO.

I wish I could figure out which wounds took place in what order. I'm hoping to find out that the first few wounds damaged her brain so that she really didn't feel pain, just the shock of it.

And I don't see any major wound at the base of her brain where the skull was open and showed the brain as was stated in the AR. I don't see the drawing for this at the base of her brain. The wound to the neck is too low below the skull. It must have been by her ear. I give up!

oops, meant to respond further.....

would be nice to think she didn't suffer, but i have a feeling she did...Michelle didn't go down w/o a good hard struggle, imo....just from reading the autopsy report, i'm thinking along the lines of the last few blows were made to the left side of her head & that blow around the temperal lobe (sp?) probably killed her....(i really have no idea, but it just sounds that way to me)....i think that was the end, at that point, with her on the floor, on her right side, still trying to protect her head with her hands/arms..

 

[close_enough]

ok, Scandi....i'm really off to bed this time...see ya in the morning!

 

[scandi]

Agreed Close. I read somewhere tonight that she didn't necessarily die after that last blow was thrown to her temple. And the amount of blood that Cassidy and the dog trapsed through shows that I think. But she had to be unconscious, don't you think? And after her brain was dead her heart could have still been beating, pumping blood. I know when my hubby died his heart beat for some time after his brain was gone. I just don't know how it really works.

Nitey Nite sweetie. You are a real trooper Close. Seeing you like I did off and on all day long when I didn't even dare post as it would take too long. LOL

"If I were a rich woman, Ta Ta deedle deelde deedle all the day, . . . . . ."

Scandi

 

[strach304]

Another similarity to the Peterson case - tiffany lamp. Ohhh Geez.
I can remember JY having to give a sample of his pubic hair - how do you figure this fits in Strach?

I didn't know that, I didn't follow the Peterson east case. There are a lot of cuts on Michele is why I thought of the glass and her being hit with something hard enough and the force to not only break her jaw and fracture her skull but knock out her teeth too. One things clear they wanted to make sure she was dead. If pubic hair was found during autopsy wouldn't that be in the report? I think that could be standard procedure as they did that with Scott Peterson and maybe we assumed it was to prove chlorine wasn't the cause of his new hair color.

 

[scandi]

I thought of that too Strach, but if she was hit with that like glass to create cuts in her flesh, there would have been glass in her wounds, and there wasn't or it would have been noted. Just like they noted there was no metal in her scalp.

 

[strach304]

Very Good Close and thank you.

I think that wherever there were abrasions these were the 'secondary' or ansillary marks made by whatever weapon was used by the killer. Kind of like a rope burn would make, turn red and maybe get a bit puffy.

If your arm was hit by this mag flashlight, the force of the edge of the rim of it would cause the crescent or jagged laceration {depending on the angle and how it landed on the skin},and the red marks the ME drew in the diagram acc to Baden were these stridations that were on the weapon and made an imprint in the skin when the blow was struck.

You'd think they could find a weapon to match those injuries to her body, and I bet they know just what it was. Unfortunately, like Charlie says, it might be out by Duffield hiding in some obscure place.

How about cast iron that has a rough shabby chic finish, not smooth and has the groves for a design in the style of a candlestick but is an electric lamp? If it's a set then they have the other to compare. From the beginning we thought they knew what the murder weapon was and I'm sure they do but don't have the actual one used but have the matching one. Whatever it is a lamp, flashlight or whatever I'm sure we've guessed it anyway. In the Robb case the ME said it was something with a long cyclinder shape like a fireplace poker or crow bar. If the ME told LE the possibilities in this case they aren't releasing that info and I'm sure he did.

 

[strach304]

I need to see what Sami is posting on the livor mortis, something isn't clicking for me there if the fixed position has to be 8 hours or more that doesn't make sense to me since she was found around 1:30 pm. Maybe she wasn't killed in the bedroom but placed there later?

 

[Samiya]

Posterior Livor. (For you Scandi)

The shifting of Anterior Livor to Posterior Livor is due to moving, transporting and maintaining the body's position from face down to face up. Note that for Livor to 'shift' from Anterior to Posterior, then Livor was not 'fixed' at the time of movement of the body.....

'Not fixed' usually means that the body wasn't in one position for 8 hours straight.

Sami

Okes, I'm back and will add more. This isn't easy to explain in easy terms but I will try my best, lol. You'll have to bare with me and ask questions if you need to.

Body with fixed Livor Mortis...

Deceased is discovered 1:30pm and had been laying in face down position for a period of 16 hours. The body has not been moved at all since TOD. Investigations, etc have occurred, body is turned over to lay on it's back. It is transported to the ME on it's back and remains in that position until autopsy. Livor Mortis would be 'fixed' and when the body is turned over, blood pooling will not change. It will stay 'Anterior'.

Body with Livor not fixed....

Deceased is discovered 1:30pm (thereabouts) and had been laying in face down position for a period of 5 hours. The body has not been moved at all since TOD.
Investigations, etc have occurred, body is turned over to lay on it's back. It is transported to the ME on it's back and remains in that position until autopsy. Livor Mortis would not be 'fixed' and as a result of turning it onto it's back and the body remaining in that position, blood pooling 'shifts' to Posterior to reflect the change in the position of the body.

In Michelle's case, the shift in livor is due to her being turned onto her back after discovery....not by Meredith. If Livor was partially fixed, then some pooling would have remained Anterior and any non fixed Livor would pool according to gravity....in this case, to her Posterior position.

Remaining bruising from wounds does not shift due to surrounding swollen tissue trapping the blood in that area. As the blood ages it becomes darker.

So.......Scandi, you can breathe a tiny bit easier knowing that the murderer was not the one who changed Michelle position. The shift occurred after discovery due to rolling Chelle over, transporting her to the ME and her subsequent wait for the autopsy to begin.

Hope that helped ease confusion.

Note: In the AR the Livor is stated as "Dark, posterior". This means that at the time the autopsy began, it was 'fixed' and on the back of the body. Rigor Mortis had completed it's process and Algor Mortis final.

You cannot know how 'glad' (I have no idea what word to use as there's nothing to be glad about here, grrr) I was to see that bub was intact with no separation of the placenta from the uterine wall or partial preterm delivery.

Sami

 

[Samiya]

And to quote myself coz I just lurve yapping at this time of the morning (or night here, lol) I just caught where I caused some confusion....

*Not fixed' usually means that the body wasn't in one position for 8 hours straight.*

Apologies folks as I had to duck out for a few hours.

Sami

 

[packerdog]

How did the blood get on the bed? Did she lay in bed with her clothes on watching tv?

I hope the hair that was found on/in her hand has a root. If it did have a root it was pulled out.

I have 2 sets of fireplace tools. One set is brass and really heavy, the poker has 2 parts that jet out and it looks like it could make some of the marks I saw on MY head, tapered at one end.

You guys are probably all sleeping in now after being up most of the night. What great ideas you all have come up with.

 

[nanandjim]

Maybe that's why his stepdad suggested he get an attorney pronto, eh? This whole thing makes me sick.

You know, that's a really good point. The stepfather had to think that he needed an attorney. Why else get him one immediately? Also, to refuse to even talk to the police, says everything to me. This guy did not love his wife one iota, IMO. Any normal person would be cooperating with police to find the killer of a loved one. Hell, even if he didn't love her, you'd think that he'd want to find the killer of his daughter's and son's mother. I thought that he was really looking forward to having a son. Uh-huh...Right...

 

[nanandjim]

Me too Nan. He met his match with her, imo. I doubt LE noticed anything the next day- fully clothed, sunglasses - my guess. He still had the sunglasses on at the funeral. Now I'm really thinking that he had a black eye. Boy, if this is the case and his parents have seen.....!!!!

LE didn't get to photograph him until Nov 8th - 5+ days after the murder. Someone was saying over at CTV that it takes 5 days for a surface wound to heal in which case LE might have been too late.

If it was him - let's hope he got a HUGE shiner!!

I also wonder if he wore a ski mask. I think that if I were going to try to kill someone that I knew, I would have on extra clothes and a ski mask so the person couldn't see my face. Of course, I wouldn't never consider killing a loved one. So, I don't really know what the guy was thinking.

I hope that police were collecting pubic hair to match with the ones that they got from the shower drain. I hope that he took a shower and that they were able to collect evidence that he did. After reading the autopsy report, I really want them to nail him. He is one sick SOB.

ETA: I read RC's posts wondering about the left side being worse than the right. This also puzzled me. There has to be some reason for this. I also wonder about the maglite. Michelle has some lacerations to the back of the head that were 4 1/2 inches. Could a maglite cause that? I'm not sure. Also, I believe that Michelle put up a big fight and angered the killer. I believe that many of those wounds were made after she unconscious and gone. Sick, sick guy. I hope that he isn't sleeping well at night and is wondering if and when the police will be coming for him.

 

[happy2bn10ec]

Ya know, the more I think about this, the more I am totally convinced he (as in whoever committed this murder) HAD to have scratches, bruises, etc. There is no way, from the fight she put up, that he could escape with having some kinds of marks. NO WAY. I bet he has told his family that it was a fight gone bad and it was an accident. I wonder who all saw him in the first few days after the murder, besides immediate family?

And something else I have had on my mind all night - would it be worse to know, blow-by-blow, how your daughter was murdered (like Michelle's family knows) or wonder all your life how it happened (like Sharon Rocha)? Either way would be awful, but I have to wonder about that.