A neighbor is the first to spot the flames in Martha Nicholas’ frame cottage (2). By the time firemen arrive, the middle-aged woman on the living room floor is beyond saving.
A “gin” (3) bottle and the charred remains (4) of an open pack of cigarettes on the table in front of the couch where the fire smouldered and caught (5) are mute testimony (6) to a familiar tragedy: Martha must have drowsed off (7) and set the couch afire. The police detectives shrug and close their notebooks.
But on a metal table in the county morgue (8) the dead woman’s body is about to tell a different story to another kind of detective, a medical examiner.
After a careful study of the body, the medical examiner autopsies (9) Martha, starting with a Y-shaped incision (10) from shoulder to shoulder and down the middle of her chest and belly. He then plunges a needle into a vein (11) near Martha’s heart and withdraws 40 cc of blood for analysis. Martha’s fully exposed throat and respiratory organs reveal no soot (12).
The medical examiner frowns. With this type of fire, a victim’s throat should be coated with the residue of smoke inhaled before death. He peels back the flesh of Martha’s neck and peers at the fragile (13), U-shaped hyoid bone (14) at the base of her tongue. He finds a hairline fracture (15), surrounded by a small hemorrhage (16). He then rolls back her eyelids, finding the tiny hemorrhages he expects. The pinpoints of blood bear witness to strangulation (17).
He next examines her heart, stomach, liver and other organs. An assistant opens Martha’s skull with a small electric saw. The medical examiner inspects the brain, looking for bleeding, tumors or other abnormalities (18). Finding no evidence of disease, or any other injuries, he has an assistant replace her organs and sew the body up neatly.
Test results show the dead woman’s blood-alcohol level was .02 percent. She may have had a drink, but she was far from drunk. The carbon-monoxide (19) level in her blood was two percent – much too low for death by smoke inhalation. And some material under her nails was human skin, from someone with Type A blood. Matha’s blood was Type O.
The medical examiner checks his investigator’s report. From Martha’s family and friends, the investigator learned that she was a department-store supervisor, who had fired a clerk just days before, a young man with a reputation as a hothead, who was known to smoke the brand of cigarettes found on Martha’s table. And, they told the investigator, Martha Nicholas never had smoked.
The medical examiner fills in Martha’s death certificate: “Cause of death: asphyxiation (20) due to manual strangulation. Manner of death: homicide (21).”
Arrested and confronted with the medical examiner’s evidence, the young store clerk confessed that he strangled Martha and set fire to her couch, hoping the truth would be hidden forever by the flames. And it might have been, had it not been for the medical examiner – a unique kind of detective who solves mysteries with a scalpel (22) and a test tube, a keen eye and an inquiring mind.
The medical examiner is a doctor who spends four years after medical school studying pathology (23) -- the natural effects of disease on the body – and another year specializing in forensic (24) pathology, sometimes known as legal medicine. This is the science of violence and injury, of unnatural death.
Although it has ancient roots, forensic pathology is a modern science, with certification being given only in the last two decades. Yet, most of America’s larger cities have converted from coroner (25) to medical examiner systems of death investigation. The coroner is an elected or appointed official who may or may not be a doctor. Usually he isn’t and must hire doctors to perform his autopsies.
Today there are about 100 certified full-time forensic pathologists in the U.S., most of them in larger cities. (In rural and suburban areas, hospital pathologists often work part-time in this specialty.) Every violent, suspicious or unnatural death is theirs to probe (26). Working with an army of forensic scientists – investigators, toxicologists, biologists, firearms and ballistics experts, microscopists, dentists, anthropologists, even psychiatrists (27) – the medical examiner or coroner determines the cause and manner of death of more than half a million people a year, or approximately one out of every four who die. From their findings come arrests and convictions, freedom for the falsely accused, crackdowns on public-health hazards (28), and new laws to prevent unnecessary deaths.
“In real life, we aren’t concerned with ‘who has done it’,” says Dr. Michael Baden, chief medical examiner for New York City. “Our job is to find out ‘what has done it’ and ‘how’.”
That concern is what led Dr. Leslie Mootoo, chief medical examiner of Guyana, to the grisly scene of mass death at the People’s Temple settlement in Jonestown (29) in 1978. The first physician on the scene, Dr. Mootoo autopsied 70 bodies and examined many others. His startling conclusion, as related in a newspaper interview: more than 700 of the 911 persons who died at Jonestown did not commit suicide. They were murdered.
The poison used was cyanide (30). It can cause convulsions (31) and painful death. Dr. Mootoo doubts that anyone watching the first poison drinkers flail about (32) and scream would voluntarily take the portion himself. Also, he found hypodermic-needle marks (33) in the upper arms of several of the bodies of both children and adults that he examined. Dr. Mootoo said it is virtually impossible for an adult to inject himself that part of the arm.
Although crimes resulting in death account for less than ten percent of a medical examiner’s work (suicides, accidents and natural deaths unattended by a physician account for the rest), the medical examiner is a vital link in the law-enforcement chain. Often it is only the knowledge of forensic scientists that unmasks a murder..
Take the case of Howard Taylor for instance. By the time an engineer saw Howard’s body on the railroad tracks, it was too late to stop the train. Parts of Howard scattered for quite a distance. The medical examiner was bothered by a bruise around the victim’s left eye and an abrasion (34) along the left side of the nose. From the swelling and discoloration the forensic pathologist could tell the injuries occurred before the man died. Within hours, after painstaking investigation, the stab wounds that killed the man before he was dumped on the tracks became evident.
On the other hand, forensic pathologists often find that what looks like murder is a suicide, an accident or even a natural death. For example, Linda Richards had been flirting with one man after another at a party. She and her boyfriend, Bob, had words, and he slapped her. She staggered, fell and didn’t get up. At the hospital emergency room, Linda was pronounced dead on arrival.
Bob was charged with homicide. Case closed? Not at all. During the autopsy on Linda, the medical examiner found at the base of her brain a ruptured aneurysm (35), a rare defect which usually gives no warning until it bursts, frequently causing sudden death. Bob’s slap probably didn’t cause it to rupture. It was more likely an accident of nature, incredibly timed. Charges against Bob were therefore dropped.
Another important aspect of a medical examiner’s work is identification of bodies – especially when they have become decomposed or skeletonized (36). Dental records, X-rays, even the size and shape of bones, can be of help in this painstaking process.
An expert in skeletonized remains, such as Jean-Pierre Lahary of the New York City medical examiner’s office, can tell the sex, age, height and weight of a victim from as little as a single bone. “Ribs, sinus cavities (37), eye sockets can be as individual as finger prints,” says Lahary.
But medical examiners’ responsibilities are much broader than identifying bodies and solving crimes. They also act as monitors of the quality of health care in their communities.
We are watchdogs of the quality of life in this community, says Dr. Thomas Noguchi, chief medical examiner in Los Angeles. Many of the environmental, health and safety problems threatening the residents of Los Angeles first surface (38) in Dr. Noguchi’s office.
For example, in 1972 his investigators became suspicious about the ways old people were dying in several local nursing homes. They were drowning in bathtubs, choking on food, being scalded (39) to death in showers: two or three such deaths were coming in every week.
The medical examiner began holding inquests, and nursing-home staffers had to bare their practice publicly. Horror stories emerged: the nurse who forced food down the throat of a patient who had to be fed through a stomach tube, choking her to death; the aide who gave stew to a patient on a liquid diet and was unable to save her from strangling (40).
Several nursing homes lost their licenses, a few were criminally prosecuted, others began policing (41) themselves.
Thus, while the medical examiner’s work is grim(42), the rewards are great. “There’s nothing to compare to the satisfaction of contributing to the well-being of the community,” says Dr. Charles Petty, chief medical examiner in Dallas. “Our work is for the living, not the dead.”
NOTES I:
*1. detectives侦探
2. frame cottage木结构小屋
3. “gin”一种“烈酒”
4. charred remains灰烬余物
5. smouldered and caught闷烧并着了火
*6. testimony证据;证词
7. drowsed off昏昏睡去
8. morgue陈尸所
9. autopsies验尸
10. incision切开的口子
*11. vein血管;静脉
12. …respiratory organs reveal no soot. …呼吸器官内无烟尘痕迹
*13. fragile脆而易碎的
14. hyoid bone舌骨
15. fracture裂缝
*16. hemorrhage出血
17. strangulation勒毙
*18. abnormalities反常
*19. carbon-monoxide一氧化碳
*20. asphyxiation窒息
*21. homicide他杀(“suicide”为自杀。)
22. scalpel手术刀
23. pathology病理学
24. forensic供法庭审理用的
25. coroner验尸官
*26. probe探究
27. toxicologists, …毒物学家
biologists, …生物学家
firearms and ballistics experts, …火器及弹道专家
microscopists, …显微镜学专家
dentists, …牙科医师
anthropologists, …人类学家
psychiatrists, …精神病医师…
28. crackdowns on public-health hazard对危害公共卫生采取严厉措施
29. …mass death at the People’s Temple settlement in Jonestown in 1978. 一九七八年发生在琼斯敦的“人民圣殿教”集居地的大规模死亡事件。(事件发生于一九七八年十一月六日。南美圭亚那的琼斯敦附近一个大森林中。死者九百十一人,均为“人民圣殿教”的教徒。 他们被教主骗到那里过仙界生活。 经注射氰化合物,全部毙命,其中尚有儿童。)
30. cyanide氰化物
*31. convulsions惊厥
32. frail about支撑不住
33. hypodermic-needle marks皮下注射的针眼
*34. abrasion擦伤
35. ruptured aneurysm破裂的动脉瘤
36. decomposed or skeletonized(尸体之)被支解或成为骷髅
37. sinus cavities窦穴
38. surface呈现
*39. scalded被烫伤
*40. strangling窒息而死
41. policing整顿
42. grim坚强不屈的
NOTES II:
本文属新闻报道体裁,为专题介绍,选自1981年的“Reader’s Digest”2月号。 这类文章应以实为主,所涉及的为真人真事。 文中有较多的专业性词汇,并引用权威人士的原话,以增加文章的可信度。 新闻报道的题目往往新奇费解,这样才能吸引读者,以一读为快, 问一个究竟。如本文题目为“Medical Examiners”,则对此不感兴趣的读报者,往往一瞥而过。再者,加上文字流畅易懂,层次分明,环环相扣,且每一段都具有故事情节,更增强其可读性 。
EXERCISE I
True (T) or False (F)?
1. ( ) The text tells us about some detectives , who usually disguise themselves as doctors.
2. ( ) Almost every big firm in the U.S.A. employs one or two such detectives in white coats.
3. ( ) Besides the criminal cases the detectives in white coats also care for the public-health.
4. ( ) The medical examiners have to take painstaking process in identifying bodies.
5. ( ) Actually the detectives in white coats have to work with the help of medical examiners.
EXERCISE II
Multiple Choice:
1. “…the middle-aged woman on the living room floor is beyond saving.” It means that ______.
a. she has to be taken away for a better medical treatment
b. she has spent all her money
c. she has come to the end of her life
2. After the investigation of Martha’s case, the police detectives thought ______.
a. the case was rather complicated
b. the case was very clear
c. they could do nothing for that case
3. Detectives in white coats are actually ______.
a. policemen in disguise
b. doctors and physicians
c. medical examiners
4. The victims at the People’s Temple settlement were killed with ______.
a. poison
b. guns
c. gas
5. The detectives in white coats sometimes have to work with ______.
a. coroners
b. experts
c. forensic pathologists