Tag Archives: homicide

#2016WPA A World of Mayhem and Murder

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WPA—a world of murder, arson, guns and explosives! A place where at the next corner you’ll be faced with a man lying on the floor in a pool of his own blood; his brains oozing out of his eye socket, bits of brain matter flung across the floor.

This was the world in which I immersed myself for four days.

Writer’s Police Academy utilized the facilities of the Northeast Wisconsin Technical College where real cops, EMS, and fire fighters train. The first night of WPA, we were treated to a chance to interrogate police officers about the equipment they use—everything from guns, rifles, battering rams, (let me tell you—that battering ram was heavvvvy!) SWAT shields and vehicles. They went through the procedure for forced entry by SWAT.

Throughout our classes at WPA, our instructors were cops, fire fighters, arson investigators, ballistics experts, and emergency medical experts. John Flannery taught my first class, Blood Spatter, (spatter; not splatter!)
John Flannery WPA

Dry book learning was not on the menu at WPA. A homicide scene greeted us as we walked into John’s class. A bullet hole in the window, blood spatter on the wall behind the couch, the body of a male—late twenties—lying in a pool of blood, brain matter coming out of one eye socket, the skull and clumps scattered on the floor.
WPA Blood Spatter Victim

We were the officers investigating the homicide. What clues did we see? Who did we suspect was the assailant? Why was there a bloody handprint on the bookcase? Did the victim make it after being shot through the eye? Didn’t people immediately die from such a gunshot wound? Did the jar with marijuana have anything to do with the murder? Why was there a revolver close to the victim and a shell casing from a 9 mm off to one side? Did either have anything to do with the murder?

Those were the obvious clues as we first encountered the scene. Other clues slowly came to our attention under John’s careful guidance, as did the possible meaning of each clue as it pertained to the crime. Blood spatter behind the couch linked to the bloody handprint on the bookcase. The victim had been shot through the eye as seen by the blood spatter behind the couch. (No brains oozing out yet) Holding his bleeding head, he had staggered across the room, placing his bloody hand on the bookcase to stay upright, then eventually falling to the floor where we then saw his body. He was not dead at this point—contrary to what a person might think knowing about the grievous head wound.

Blood spatter WPA
Someone had entered or had been present in the apartment when the victim fell. That person had then proceeded to kill the victim. This person’s presence became clear from the blood spatter on the ceiling above the victim’s body and the spatter on the wall to the right of the victim’s body. The spatter on the ceiling created four dotted lines of blood. This pattern was also seen on the wall to the right. We learned that this was cast off blood—blood flung from the instrument itself– blood streaks made when a blunt instrument is drawn back to hit the victim again.

The assailant had used a blunt instrument to beat the victim once he had fallen to the floor. The beating was the cause of death, even though the head shot may have killed him eventually. What kind of instrument was used to beat the victim? Was it still in the apartment?

A pool cue was used to beat the victim. The blood had been carelessly wiped off, leaving a pale pink stain at the pointed end of the stick. The felt tip was responsible for the blood droplets on the floor, the droplets that were fairly round with just a faint tail. This let us know that the assailant, after beating the victim to death, had walked away from the body with the end of the cue pointed down toward the floor. The diameter and shape of the blood droplets told us that.
Blood droplets from weapon being carried

A bloody footprint indicated that someone, perhaps the assailant, had stepped in the victim’s blood. The shoe print had a pointed toe, was small—like maybe a size five or six—and had a definite heel which was square—like a woman’s pump.
WPA Shoe print in blood

After examination it was revealed that the victim had shot through the window at someone or something outside of his apartment. This accounted for the bullet hole in the window and the revolver close to the victim.

We still had the 9 mm shell casing which indicated that a 9 mm had been used inside of the apartment to shoot the victim. His assailant had then, after the victim fell, proceeded to viciously beat him in the face and head with the pointed end of the pool cue. This beating resulted in the brain oozing out of the eye socket and the caved-in look of the right side of the victim’s head. Further investigation revealed a woman’s driver’s license tossed or fallen in the trash can in the living room where the victim lay. The beating was vicious and had continued far beyond just immobilizing or killing the victim warranted. It demonstrated that this crime had been committed with passion; it was personal. We concluded that we should look at the victim’s girlfriend, wife, lover, and exes.

Though this murder had been a scenario set up by John, he also showed and explained real crime scene photos which were horrendous. The first crime scene photo was of a woman in a cabin. The woman’s body had been found crumpled between the wall and the bed. From blood stains on the bed it was obvious the woman had been resting or sleeping when the attack began. She next fell or rolled out of bed in an attempt to elude her attacker. She was standing when the attacker hit her with a sharp instrument in the head. Blood smeared down the wall as she crumpled to the floor.

The assailant continued his attack after the woman was on the floor. One of the wounds was a hacked open thigh which left the muscles gaping with blood pooled in the wound. The pooled blood indicated that the wound had been made perimortem. The heart had stopped pumping before the blood drained over the edge of the deep wound. The assailant had also removed the woman’s left hand—post mortem fortunately for the victim–and it was found next to the wall. The viciousness of the attack indicated that it had been personal.

This led the investigation to the woman’s estranged husband. The estranged husband had followed the woman to the cabin, waited until their children had gone down to the beach, and then entered and attacked the sleeping woman. The severed hand was the hand with the wedding band still on it.

Unfortunately, the couple’s young children found their mother when they returned from the beach.

In the second set of crime scene photos, a mother and her child had been killed in their home; their throats slit. John was sensitive to the fact that the death of the infant might be troubling to some people. He announced that in the coming photos that an infant had been killed and if anyone wanted to leave for this part, it was perfectly all right and they could return after this particular crime scene had been examined. A few people who had small children at home did leave for this part of our session.

John then walked the class through the crime scene photos, explaining what the blood on the woman’s arms meant—she had grabbed at her slit throat in a vain attempt to save her own life. Next we explored the baby’s photos. On the side of the child’s face, there was blood—which went with the slit throat—but there was also a clean space called a void where no blood had run. This indicated that the child had been sleeping with his head turned to the right side when his throat had been slit, but at some time after that—perimortem which means at or close to the time of death–the child had turned his head until his face pointed upward. The void occurred because when the blood was running, the turn of the head placed a small part of that cheek against some object that the blood ran around—the bed was most obviously the object. The child, before dying, had turned his head to where his face looked up and then he died.

The assailant, who turned out to be the estranged husband and father, claimed that though he confessed to the crimes that his sentence should be mitigated because he killed his wife and son with humane means that resulted in instant death and that they did not suffer—ie: a slit throat.

The woman’s bloody arms and the void on the child’s cheek proved that both victims had struggled after their throats were slit and therefore had not died instantly.

The Blood Spatter class was packed with information and this short blog post cannot give it justice. Suffice it to say that I learned a ton of stuff! John was one of the best instructors I have ever encountered. If you want to read about John’s extensive credentials go to http://www.writerspoliceacademy.com/john-flannery/

Sisters in Crime was one of the sponsors for the #WritersPoliceAcademy. To learn more about #SistersInCrime go to http://www.sistersincrime.org/

Homicide Procedures

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DID YOU KNOW….?
In the state of Washington, when a body is found or a person witnesses an assault that turns into a homicide:
1.Patrol is dispatched. When s/he arrives, they determine that the assaulted is now a decedent, or confirm there is a dead person.
2.Once confirmed that there is a dead body, it is either an “attended” or “unattended” death.
3.All “unattendeds” are suspicious. Attendeds can be suspicious, or not suspicious as in the case of expected death/terminally ill/elderly.
4.If it is at all suspicious, the scene is “locked down” or “secured”. This means limiting any and all access to the area that appears to be involved. The police start big because they can’t start over. Sometimes that means a block, a room, a house.
5.The scene is secured with anything handy, but generally with police line tape. The police will tie to anything—poles, trees, cars, fences. (FOR HEAVEN’S SAKE! DON’T STAND STILL!LOL!)
6.A scenario: A shooting is reported. Citizen calls in that an altercation occurred in front of her house, there was a shot, a man slumped to the street. She sees people running away from the scene and then getting into a car. Many other calls come in about the same incident. Some give a description of the getaway car.
All area officers respond unless stuck at jail or on other calls. The radio traffic can be insane on such calls. If the officer en route to the call, and closest to it, sees a possible matching suspect vehicle headed away from the area, that officer has to decide whether to chase the vehicle, or continue to the scene. In order to save life, the officer continues to the scene to render aid, but calls in suspect vehicle so other officers and agencies can pursue it. This is a judgment call whether to pursue or continue to scene to render aid.
First responder, a patrol officer, arrives. Due to the nature of the crime, patrol officer tries to park away from the scene. The officer doesn’t stop talking on the radio while she checks the victim to see if the victim can be saved, she puts up tape, talks to people who are present, secures the evidence and follows procedures, all at the same time!
Officer walks up to the body, sees fresh blood pooling quickly from a gunshot wound to the head, sees brain matter and a skull fragment nearby. Advises Sergeant immediately “This is going to be a callout” ( ‘callout’ is for areas who have detectives off duty in the middle of the night)
Officer advises dispatch to advise Fire (who respond due to the apparent nature of the call: a victim of a shooting)that subject is 10-10(deceased)Fire still responds to confirm the death. When it’s an obvious fatal, only one or two firefighters will step into the crime scene which is now being rapidly secured and isolated which means getting the citizen ‘helpers’ out of the way since they are standing around the body by this time, and isolating witnesses so they don’t confuse what they actually saw versus what they are cross pollinating each other with.
First responding officer secures and isolates scene. The officer marks placement of evidence, sometimes using something as simple as pieces of paper from their notebook and folding the paper to cover any evidence like a bullet casing, bullet, cell phone, key, and so forth. This is a temporary measure until the real evidence team can arrive and start photographing and measuring those things. The body is left where it lies so detectives can gather evidence and examine the position of the body, impact points, and recover evidence, photograph the body and so on.
Once the detectives have adequately documented and recovered evidence, the body is taken by the Medical Examiner’s officer for an autopsy. Detectives attend the autopsy.
When cause of death is determined, the body is released to the family and goes to a funeral home. Delay of release depends on how quickly cause of death is determined. If there are toxicology screens or other lab reports pending the body is kept until they are finished. Usually not long, within a week mostly.

During the writing of my murder mysteries, Dead Men and Cats(available on amazon.com), and Sketch of a Murder COMING IN AUGUST, 2013 I have been fortunate to meet some great law enforcement folks. One such person is SUZANNE EVISTON. Suzanne is not only an officer, but also a K9 handler and trainer for K9 teams. MANY thanks to Officer #SuzanneEviston for her wonderful patience in helping me to understand the procedure that occurs when a homicide is reported. As always, any mistakes are mine.