Did She Fall or Was She Pushed?

**Vedderman** · #1 ● 03-27-2013, 04:04 AM

Interesting case here.

Subject is a 22 year old art student. She was was missed by her family on a Saturday and they immediately started searching for her, fearing something was wrong. Indeed. Unfortunately, she was discovered later that night in the back seat of her car as you see in the photos, with her neck broken and a fracture in the back of her skull. Both injuries were entirely internal, so initially the police were somewhat confused at the lack of obvious violence.

The family pushed the issue, alleging murder, and demanded an investigation. And they got one. Eventually the police turned up a man that the dead girl had been seen with a lot lately. Coincidentally, he had fled to another country the very morning after she was found with a broken neck.

After several months of wrangling and extradition negotiations, he finally turned himself in and returned for a police interview. His story was as follows:

He claimed that the young woman had been very depressed lately and talking of suicide. On the night in question, they were hanging out and watching tv when she disappeared for a long time into the kitchen. He claimed he heard her 'mixing something with a spoon.' Eventually she returned to the tv room, but was acting oddly. At first she was just a bit incoherent, but after a short time he said that she began vomiting and went to the bathroom in her pants.

He initially assumed she had mixed herself a strong drink and that she was totally plastered, corroborated by the vomiting and pants-soiling. But he quickly realized that it was more serious than that. At this point, in a panic, she admitted taking rat poison to try and kill herself. He said he immediately tried to get her to the car to take her to the hospital.

Only problem? She slipped on the porch while he was half-carrying her, fell down a flight of stairs, and broke her neck. He claims he panicked, fearing that he would be implicated because he was her boyfriend, so he chucked her body in the backseat of her car and fled the country.

Is there any merit to his story? Sounds fishy to me. And also to the prosecutors. There is currently an exhumation order for her body to determine if she ingested rat poison. I'm surprised it didn't get mentioned in the autopsy, but not all autopsies are as thorough as they should be.

The police DID find an open packet of rat poison when they searched the kitchen. And that is one of the primary methods of suicide for young women (along with hanging) in most Latin American countries. Further, the photos of her body make it very clear that her pants are soiled, just like he said. This is a very common side effect of ingesting rat poison, even in non-lethal doses. But it could just as easily have happened when she suffered a head injury and died. Hard to say for sure, though I guess the post-exhumation autopsy will shed some light.