Bizarro Bizarro Bizarro
Jun. 19th, 2002 01:10 pmthis was emailed to me by my cousin
At the 1994 annual awards dinner given for Forensic Science, AAFS President
Dr. Don Harper Mills astounded his audience with the legal complications
of a bizarre death. Here is the story :
On March 23, 1994 the medical examiner viewed the body of Ronald Opus and
concluded that he died from a shotgun wound to the head.
Mr. Opus had jumped from the top of a ten-story building intending to
commit suicide. He left a note to the effect indicating his
despondency. As he fell past the ninth floor his life was interrupted by a
shotgun blast passing through a window, which killed him instantly.
Neither the shooter nor the deceased was aware that a safety net had been
installed just below the eighth floor level to protect some building
workers and that Ronald Opus would not have been able to complete his
suicide the way he had planned.
"Ordinarily," Dr. Mills continued, "A person who sets out to commit
suicide and ultimately succeeds, even though the mechanism might not be
what he intended, is still defined as committing suicide. That Mr.
Opus was shot on the way to certain death, but probably would not have been
successful because of the safety net, caused the medical examiner to feel
that he had a homicide on his hands.
The room on the ninth floor, where the shotgun blast emanated, was occupied
by an elderly man and his wife. They were arguing vigorously and he was
threatening her with a shotgun. The man was so upset that when he pulled
the trigger he completely missed his wife and the pellets went through the
window striking Mr. Opus.
When one intends to kill subject "A" but kills subject "B" in the attempt,
one is guilty of the murder of subject "B." When confronted with the
murder charge the old man and his wife were both adamant and both said that
they thought the shotgun was unloaded. The old man said it was a
long-standing habit to threaten his wife with the unloaded shotgun. He had
no intention to murder her. Therefore the killing of Mr. Opus appeared to
be an accident; that is, if the gun had been accidentally loaded.
The continuing investigation turned up a witness who saw the old couple's
son loading the shotgun about six weeks prior to the fatal accident. It
transpired that the old lady had cut off her son's financial support and
the son, knowing the propensity of his father to use the shotgun
threateningly, loaded the gun with the expectation that his father would
shoot his mother. Since the loader of the gun was aware of this, he was
guilty of the murder even though he didn't actually pull the trigger.
The case now becomes one of murder on the part of the son for the death of
Ronald Opus.
Now comes the exquisite twist. Further investigation revealed that the son
was, in fact, Ronald Opus. He had become increasingly despondent over the
failure of his attempt to engineer his mother's murder. This led him to
jump off the ten story building on March 23rd, only to be killed by a
shotgun blast passing through the ninth story window.
The son had actually murdered himself so the medical examiner closed the
case as a suicide.
A true story from Associated Press, Reported by Kurt Westervelt.
At the 1994 annual awards dinner given for Forensic Science, AAFS President
Dr. Don Harper Mills astounded his audience with the legal complications
of a bizarre death. Here is the story :
On March 23, 1994 the medical examiner viewed the body of Ronald Opus and
concluded that he died from a shotgun wound to the head.
Mr. Opus had jumped from the top of a ten-story building intending to
commit suicide. He left a note to the effect indicating his
despondency. As he fell past the ninth floor his life was interrupted by a
shotgun blast passing through a window, which killed him instantly.
Neither the shooter nor the deceased was aware that a safety net had been
installed just below the eighth floor level to protect some building
workers and that Ronald Opus would not have been able to complete his
suicide the way he had planned.
"Ordinarily," Dr. Mills continued, "A person who sets out to commit
suicide and ultimately succeeds, even though the mechanism might not be
what he intended, is still defined as committing suicide. That Mr.
Opus was shot on the way to certain death, but probably would not have been
successful because of the safety net, caused the medical examiner to feel
that he had a homicide on his hands.
The room on the ninth floor, where the shotgun blast emanated, was occupied
by an elderly man and his wife. They were arguing vigorously and he was
threatening her with a shotgun. The man was so upset that when he pulled
the trigger he completely missed his wife and the pellets went through the
window striking Mr. Opus.
When one intends to kill subject "A" but kills subject "B" in the attempt,
one is guilty of the murder of subject "B." When confronted with the
murder charge the old man and his wife were both adamant and both said that
they thought the shotgun was unloaded. The old man said it was a
long-standing habit to threaten his wife with the unloaded shotgun. He had
no intention to murder her. Therefore the killing of Mr. Opus appeared to
be an accident; that is, if the gun had been accidentally loaded.
The continuing investigation turned up a witness who saw the old couple's
son loading the shotgun about six weeks prior to the fatal accident. It
transpired that the old lady had cut off her son's financial support and
the son, knowing the propensity of his father to use the shotgun
threateningly, loaded the gun with the expectation that his father would
shoot his mother. Since the loader of the gun was aware of this, he was
guilty of the murder even though he didn't actually pull the trigger.
The case now becomes one of murder on the part of the son for the death of
Ronald Opus.
Now comes the exquisite twist. Further investigation revealed that the son
was, in fact, Ronald Opus. He had become increasingly despondent over the
failure of his attempt to engineer his mother's murder. This led him to
jump off the ten story building on March 23rd, only to be killed by a
shotgun blast passing through the ninth story window.
The son had actually murdered himself so the medical examiner closed the
case as a suicide.
A true story from Associated Press, Reported by Kurt Westervelt.
