With all due respect I don't think it's accurate to use a drawn picture to show the proximity of the brain to the front of the skull. I have attached my own brain MRI. As you can see from the front of the skull to the frontal lobe is mere centimeters. It was said the bullet entered from the right forehead above the brow and lodged in the left cheek. If you did a trajectory on an actual anatomical depiction of a brain MRI it would seem that it would have to enter the brain, as the medical examiner stated. Also if it did not it would pierce through the optic nerves leaving TA unable to see. Also gun shot wounds cause skull fractures upon entry and it's a high impact force causing concussive damage and shock to the brain that injures parts of the brain that were never touched by the bullet. I just think TA would have been unable to travel as far as he did with a gun shot wound to the face at such close range. Also if you study forensic pathology close range gun shot wounds leave burnt on shoot and burn wounds to the skin around the site of entry. It is debatable how close she would have shot him though I guess. I also think it's very telling that the medical examiner didn't find much blood inside the cranial cavity which would be indicative of the victim having bled out prior to the shot as otherwise much bleeding would have occurred as the scalp, facial area, eyes, and frontal lobe have extensive blood supply. Also I believe the medical examiner is the person that would know for certain whether the bullet entered the brain or not. He has seen inside of TA's cranial cavity. Even though the brain was too decomposed to examine the bones do not decompose. He would have been able to see the trajectory through the bones, it would have had to enter the cranial cavity and exit the cranial cavity into the cheek to hit the brain. I just can't imagine that it would just go through TA's sinuses and not enter his cranial cavity at all and this ME not be able to tell the difference in bony trajectory that never decomposes. There can be no error in that. This is why I believe TA was shot last. All MOO and JMO. I don't care about that spent cartridge, it could have been washed off, etc. It's all about forensically the bullet trajectory, blood loss, and ability of movement after a gun shot wound.
I hope one day after JA is convicted she decides to tell the details of what she did to TA!
I am a newbie on here. Thanks for letting me on board!
Thank you for the very insightful post! These are the precise reasons I do not think TA was shot first, though I do not have the technical prowess to explain it the way that you did. It seemed impossible to me that he would be able to function after a head wound, and I saw no way that it would not effect his mental capacity severely, and vision as you described, in order for him to move about as he did.
I have been the victim of an assault via a mugging in which the perp saw fit to hit my head against a sidewalk curb over and over until intervened/stopped. I had an open wound in the back of my head that required 3-4 staples, hence, not that big of a gash. What I do remember is how much it bled! It looked 1000 times worse than the wound really was. Head wounds are notoriously bloody. My point is that if the ME stated that he had apparently already "bled out" due to the lack of blood/bleeding witnessed from this gunshot wound, he was not shot first, IMO.
What amazes me is that JA, who I see as entirely narcissistic and a sociopath (for starters) would actually risk being A) overpowered by TA and thus caught, and B) injured and in pain herself had she been, again, overpowered. Except if JA had tied him up, restraining him with TA under the impression that JA was insinuating she was going to do something kinky to him, hence all of the fiber evidence at the crime scene.
Then again, it is absolutely impossible for me to understand the motives behind such heinous crimes… It gives me the 'heebie-geebies'. Granted, this is how I believe it happened IMO: stabbed, throat sliced when he had lost enough blood to relax enough for her to accomplish that horrifying near decapitation, and then shot.