How are coroners able to find specific details about a dead body, like the time of death, cause of death, and even the distance between the victim and the attacker?

Question

How are coroners able to find specific details about a dead body, like the time of death, cause of death, and even the distance between the victim and the attacker?

In: Biology

Answer 1

Time of death…found based on what they see and the current time…for example, if the body is stiff, then the person died a few hours earlier but a day earlier (then it would be limp again). Usually this is determined by maggots…which take 3 days to form…no maggots = 2 days or less

Cause of death…look for anything out of the ordinary that couldn’t exist in a living person…like a hole in the head. If there’s water in the lungs, then they drown.

Distance….that’s determined by blood splatter. The size of the droplets and the pattern when it hits a surface tells a lot. I know the least about this but the old O.J. trial taught a lot about it. Round drops mean the blood fell from above. A linear splatter means the blood came at an angle…and it points in the direction it came from.