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Post-mortem computed tomography in forensic shooting distance estimation: a porcine cadaver study

OBJECTIVES: Gunshot wounds are frequently studied using computed tomography (CT) to examine tissue damage. In this study, we aimed to test the potential of post-mortem CT (PMCT) in shooting distance estimation at distances 0–100 cm. We hypothesized that in addition to the wound channel, we could als...

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Autores principales: Junno, Juho-Antti, Kotiaho, Antti, Oura, Petteri
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: BioMed Central 2022
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8925149/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35296333
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s13104-022-05997-2
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author Junno, Juho-Antti
Kotiaho, Antti
Oura, Petteri
author_facet Junno, Juho-Antti
Kotiaho, Antti
Oura, Petteri
author_sort Junno, Juho-Antti
collection PubMed
description OBJECTIVES: Gunshot wounds are frequently studied using computed tomography (CT) to examine tissue damage. In this study, we aimed to test the potential of post-mortem CT (PMCT) in shooting distance estimation at distances 0–100 cm. We hypothesized that in addition to the wound channel, we could also potentially detect tissue damage caused by muzzle pressure on PMCT. RESULTS: A total of 59 gunshot wounds (23 contact shots, 21 close-range shots, 15 distant shots) were inflicted on eight piglet carcasses with a .22 Long Rifle handgun. PMCT scans were obtained using clinical equipment, and they were evaluated for wound characteristics by visual inspection and numeric measurements. In our data, contact shots could be clearly distinguished from close-range and distant shots by a hyperdense ring-shaped area surrounding the outermost part of the wound channel. Close-range and distant shot wounds did not have this feature and were difficult to distinguish from each other. The mean wound channel diameter ranged from 3.4 to 5.4 mm, being smallest in contact shots and largest in distant shots. These preliminary findings suggest that PMCT may aid the estimation of shooting distance. As this study only addressed low velocity gunshot wounds in carcasses, further studies are warranted. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s13104-022-05997-2.
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spelling pubmed-89251492022-03-23 Post-mortem computed tomography in forensic shooting distance estimation: a porcine cadaver study Junno, Juho-Antti Kotiaho, Antti Oura, Petteri BMC Res Notes Research Note OBJECTIVES: Gunshot wounds are frequently studied using computed tomography (CT) to examine tissue damage. In this study, we aimed to test the potential of post-mortem CT (PMCT) in shooting distance estimation at distances 0–100 cm. We hypothesized that in addition to the wound channel, we could also potentially detect tissue damage caused by muzzle pressure on PMCT. RESULTS: A total of 59 gunshot wounds (23 contact shots, 21 close-range shots, 15 distant shots) were inflicted on eight piglet carcasses with a .22 Long Rifle handgun. PMCT scans were obtained using clinical equipment, and they were evaluated for wound characteristics by visual inspection and numeric measurements. In our data, contact shots could be clearly distinguished from close-range and distant shots by a hyperdense ring-shaped area surrounding the outermost part of the wound channel. Close-range and distant shot wounds did not have this feature and were difficult to distinguish from each other. The mean wound channel diameter ranged from 3.4 to 5.4 mm, being smallest in contact shots and largest in distant shots. These preliminary findings suggest that PMCT may aid the estimation of shooting distance. As this study only addressed low velocity gunshot wounds in carcasses, further studies are warranted. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s13104-022-05997-2. BioMed Central 2022-03-16 /pmc/articles/PMC8925149/ /pubmed/35296333 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s13104-022-05997-2 Text en © The Author(s) 2022 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Open AccessThis article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) . The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/ (https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) ) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated in a credit line to the data.
spellingShingle Research Note
Junno, Juho-Antti
Kotiaho, Antti
Oura, Petteri
Post-mortem computed tomography in forensic shooting distance estimation: a porcine cadaver study
title Post-mortem computed tomography in forensic shooting distance estimation: a porcine cadaver study
title_full Post-mortem computed tomography in forensic shooting distance estimation: a porcine cadaver study
title_fullStr Post-mortem computed tomography in forensic shooting distance estimation: a porcine cadaver study
title_full_unstemmed Post-mortem computed tomography in forensic shooting distance estimation: a porcine cadaver study
title_short Post-mortem computed tomography in forensic shooting distance estimation: a porcine cadaver study
title_sort post-mortem computed tomography in forensic shooting distance estimation: a porcine cadaver study
topic Research Note
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8925149/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35296333
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s13104-022-05997-2
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