Yes, I believe I knife could significantly impair him, quickly.
Even without a gunshot wound, a stab wound to the chest would have caused immediate pain and difficulty breathing, confusion, severe weakness, rapid heartbeat, lowered blood pressure, lethargy and, soon, excessive sleepiness. And that's just one stab wound to the chest. He had five.
Dr. Horn testified it's likely Travis was stabbed in the heart first. That wound is described in the autopsy report as "A 1 1/2 inch oblique stab wound of the paramidline right chest, with penetration/perforation of the costochondral junction near the sternum at the level of the 3rd and 4th right ribs; the wound extends to a maximal depth of approximately 3 1/2 inches with penetration of the superior vena cava near the base of the heart, with a small amount of surrounding hemorrhagic in the mediastinal soft tissues and the pericardial sac of the heart..."
In other words, a 3 1/2" deep stab to the chest cavity and a major cardiac vessel. Anybody who has ever experienced costocondritis, which is a simple inflammation of rib cartilage, knows the feeling of suddenly being unable to breathe. Some people go to the emergency room believing they are having a heart attack. If the knife penetrated the costochondral junction, it must have been incredibly painful and debilitating.
He would have been practically unable to fight her off, though the cuts on his hands show he tried. We don't know how many of the 5 chest wounds she was able to inflict before 5:31:14, when the ceiling photo was snapped, but since it was 44 seconds after the last seated photo, I would lay odds that at least one stab was inflicted by the time of the ceiling photo.
kay:
