When a corpse is found at the foot of a cliff, the investigator is faced with a dilemma about the type of incident: accident, suicide, or potential homicide. Moreover, it is necessary to identify the victim, determine the time of death, and collect evidence. The first step will be an external examination of the corpse. This makes it possible to judge the time and place of death, whether the corpse was moved, the method and means of death. Girard (2021) notes that this information is often speculative, as such questions can only be answered accurately by the cadaver’s forensic examination. However, through the examination of the victim, primary information will be collected from which conclusions can be drawn.
Important objects of search and analysis during examination are traces, including the display of hands, feet, teeth, clothing fabric of a likely criminal, as well as their secretions, including blood, semen, saliva, sweat, and nasal mucus. Valuable finds can be things dropped by a criminal. These include clothing items, a hat, items with tags, a belt buckle, a button, a comb, a note, or a travel card. In turn, the time of death is determined by the corpse’s temperature, the degree of its stiffness, the presence and severity of cadaveric spots. Moreover, puddles and abundant streaks of blood, depending on the degree of its drying and color, the condition of the ground cover and vegetation on it, traces in the snow, the presence of fallen snow, dry soil under the corpse after rain, or a smoking cigarette butt may indicate the time of the incident.
It is equally important to study the place where the corpse was found to understand whether the victim fell or was dropped. The discrepancy between the place of death and the place of discovery of the corpse is evidenced by dragging marks on the ground and the corpse, traces of vehicles, the presence of a device for carrying the corpse, and the absence of a pool of blood in case of extensive bodily injuries. When examining shoes, attention should be paid to the soles. Sometimes they may contain particles of such soil or other loose substances that are not found at the site of the discovery of the corpse. This circumstance indicates that the place of discovery of the corpse is not the place of the murder. Harris and Lee (2019) assert that no matter how carefully, accurately, and secretly the criminal’s preliminary actions are, there are always some traces.
Since there is a possibility of an accident in which the victim fell off a cliff, the fate of the peculiarity of the incident of a fall from a height follows. Among them, the position of the corpse about the object from which the person fell, the distance from the parietal region of the head, the center of gravity of the body, the feet to the perpendicular of the fall with the plane of impact, as well as the posture of the corpse. Girard (2021) highlights such aspects of a fall accident as deformities of individual parts of the body, including the head, ankles, and feet, one-sidedness of injuries (in direct free fall), the presence of damage to the nails, palmar surfaces of the fingers, and hands. Thus, it is important to identify the absence or presence of injuries not characteristic of a fall from a height, including cut, chopped, stab-cut, and gunshot wounds.
The key task of the investigator is to identify the victim. To do this, all the pockets in the clothes on the corpse are carefully examined to find some little things that can help in identification. Harris and Lee (2019) affirm that when examining the corpse of an unknown person, the pockets of clothing should be turned inside out, the dust should be shaken out of them, as well as the dust present in the cuffs at the ends of the trousers, and placed in a glass test tube. This dust can help determine the victim’s occupation, which will aid in identification.
Questioning citizens can be an additional forensic method for collecting information. Citizens who may have been near the incident site before, during, or after the incident are important. Witnesses are interrogated about the reasons why they were at the scene of the incident, whom they met on the way to him or from him, under what circumstances the death of the victim occurred, who else was present at the same time.
In this case, evidence of murder may be found. Firstly, a woman could be thrown off a cliff unintentionally as a result of a petty scuffle. Secondly, there is a place to be premeditated murder. If the victim is identified and found to have been in a relationship with reports of domestic violence, the idea that intentional homicide occurred becomes more likely. In continuation of the investigation, it is advisable to interview people close to the victim.
Therefore, it is important to examine the body for signs of abuse. It is equally important to study the location of the discovery of the victim. In this case, the study of the situation should help find answers to the questions: what happened – a murder, suicide, or an accident, how the event happened and whether suicide was staged, and when the event occurred. It is important to carefully examine the area around the corpse to detect footprints of the criminal, traces of vehicles, traces of smoking, and other material evidence. Moreover, after identifying the person, it is necessary to interrogate the victim’s environment to exclude or confirm the version of deliberate murder.
References
Girard, J. E. (2021). Criminalistics: Forensic science, crime, and terrorism. Jones & Bartlett Learning.
Harris, H. A., & Lee, H. C. (2019). Introduction to forensic science and criminalistics (2nd ed.). Taylor & Francis.