ABSTRACT
Since March 1, 2015, the National Forensic Service Seoul Institute has commenced postmortem inspections at the death scene in agreement with the Korean National Police Agency. Included regions were mainly Seoul Metropolitan Police Agency Wide Area 8 (Gangseo, Yangcheon, Guro police stations), and several other areas. In total, 837 postmortem inspection cases from March 1 to December 31, 2015, were analyzed statistically. Of these, 168 were autopsy cases, and the rates were 20% (67 cases) in Gangseo Police, 14.5% (30 cases) in Yangcheon Police, and 22% (57 cases) in Guro Police stations. For 269 cases of “unknown cause of death”, the autopsy rates were 44% in Gangseo Police, 36% in Yangcheon Police, and 47% in Guro Police stations. For 82 cases of fall from height, autopsy rates were 17% (n=14). Of the 133 cases of hanging, 121 cases were classified as suicide at the scene with a 2.5% (n=3) autopsy rate. Twelve cases were classified as an undetermined manner of death at the scene with a 33% (n=4) autopsy rate. The distribution of the “manner of death” was natural death for 29% (n=250), unnatural death for 38% (n=318), and other and undetermined manner of death for 32% (n=269) of cases. Proportions of dispatch times were 49.2% (412 cases) during work hours (09:00-18:00), 15.7% (n=131) during evening hours (18:00-21:00), 13% (n=110) at night (21:00-24:00), 10% (n=88) at dawn (24:00-06:00), and 11% (n=96) during morning hours (06:00-09:00). The male to female sex ratio was 1.96:1 (556:281). These statistics are valuable for evaluation of postmortem inspections by experts.
Subject(s)
Female , Humans , Male , Autopsy , Cause of Death , Police , Seoul , Sex Ratio , SuicideABSTRACT
From January 1, 2016 to December 31, 2016, a total of 1147 postmortem inspection cases in Area 8, Seoul Metropolitan Police Agency (Gangseo, Yangcheon, and Guro police stations) were statistically analyzed. Autopsies were performed in 205 cases (17.9%), and the autopsy rates were 17.6% (75/426 cases) in the Gangseo police station, 9.5% (34/357 cases) in the Yangcheon police station, and 24.3% (82/337 cases) in the Guro police station. For 288 cases with an unknown cause of death, the autopsy rates were 70.0% (60/87 cases) in the Gangseo police station, 28.6% (26/91 cases) in the Yangcheon police station, and 63.1% (65/103 cases) in the Guro police station. For 65 cases due to fall from height, the autopsy rate was 7.7% (n=5). Of the 187 cases due to hanging, 155 cases were classified as suicide at the scene with a 4.5% (n=7) autopsy rate and 32 cases were classified as an undetermined manner of death at the scene with a 15.6% (n=5) autopsy rate. The distribution of the “manner of death” was natural death, 45% (n=516); unnatural death, 29.9% (n=343); and other and undetermined, 25.1% (n=288). Proportions of dispatch times were 50.9% (584 cases) during work hours (09:00–18:00), 13.8% (n=158) during evening hours (18:00–21:00), 13.4% (n=154) at night (21:00–00:00), 11% (n=126) at dawn (00:00–06:00), and 10.9% (n=125) during morning hours (06:00–09:00). The male-to-female ratio was 1.86:1 (746:401). These statistics are valuable for the evaluation of postmortem inspections by experts.
Subject(s)
Humans , Autopsy , Cause of Death , Police , Seoul , SuicideABSTRACT
Forensic autopsies were performed on 1,821 cases in 2014 and 2,024 cases in 2015 at the National Forensic Service Seoul Institute. Based on the autopsy reports, 103 cases (5.7%) in 2014 and 130 cases (6.4%) in 2015 were selected as unnatural deaths caused by fatal intoxication. The cases were divided into five groups. The first group had ethanol intoxication, the second had drug intoxication, the third had agrochemical intoxication, the fourth had cyanide intoxication, and the fifth had miscellaneous intoxications. Of the 233 cases, 202 had death certificates. Of these 202 cases, 169 (83.7%) had an undetermined manner of death (MOD); 17 (8.4%) had an unnatrual MOD and intoxication was the cause of death (COD); nine (4.5%) had an unnatural MOD, but the COD was not intoxication; seven (3.5%) had a natural MOD and disease as a COD. The predictive ratios of intoxication as a COD were compared with the death certificates and the police death scene investigation results. The death certificates and the police investigation results showed predictive ratios of 8.4% and 55.2%, respectively, for intoxication as a COD. The discrepance in these predictive ratios and relatively low predictive ratio of police investigation results mean that intoxicated deaths have been underevaluated; thus, some homicides or intentional deaths were probably missed under South Korea's death investigation system. Doctors who specialize in forensic medicine need to supervise the entire postmortem examination process and emergency blood toxicological analysis should be performed in South Korea.