title: Unusual characteristic patterns of postmortem injuries.
abstract: Animal scavenging is one of the most significant causes of postmortem injuries. A large variety of scavenging animals have been reported on in previous papers. Although postmortem injuries attributable to birds are well known in the case of "aerial burial," the custom in Tibet, few cases of bird scavenging have been reported. In the two cases discussed herein, postmortem injuries were attributed to crows. Both cases, shared characteristic patterns of postmortem injuries, and in both cases death was attributed to fire. Although massive tissue loss by the crow scavenging made it difficult to determine the cause of the death and rendered personal identification difficult, 1 mL of blood drawn from the intracranial cavity and DNA analysis enabled this information to be determined, albeit with some difficulty.
authors.affiliation: Department of Legal Medicine, Shinshu University School of Medicine. asamura@sch.md.shinshu-u.ac.jp
authors.forename: Hideki
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Asamura
authors.forename: Kayoko
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Takayanagi
authors.forename: Masao
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Ota
authors.forename: Kanya
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Kobayashi
authors.forename: Hirofumi
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Fukushima
mesh_terms: D000368:Aged; D000818:Animals; D005247:Feeding Behavior; D005260:Female; D005390:Fires; D018732:Forensic Anthropology; D006801:Humans; D011180:Postmortem Changes; D020308:Songbirds; D014947:Wounds and Injuries / Q000473:pathology*