Identification of the skeletal remains of the Czech communist regime crime victim, priest Josef Toufar.

Parish priest Josef Toufar died as a direct consequence of torture committed by Communist State Security Service agents, forcing him to confess that "miraculous" movement of crucifix above the main altar during the Holy Mass held in the Roman-Catholic church in Cíhost was staged by using a technical equipment. Josef Toufar was presumably buried in a mass grave at the cemetery in Prague-Dáblice under a false name Josef Zouhar. In 2013 the Czech Bishops' Conference grant an approval to begin the process of his beatification. However, the beatification required the exhumation and identification of the remains. In this case report, we describe the process of searching, exhumation, and the combined A-STR/Y-STR DNA analysis of remains of Pater Josef Toufar. His identification was feasible due to kinship analysis: buccal swabs of three family members (niece, grand-niece, and grand-nephew) were available for testing.

[Identification of an Unknown Person through the Bone Implant]. / Identifikace neznámé osoby za pomoci kostního implantátu.

It is always a big challenge to identify unknown dead persons. All the more so if their body is found decomposed beyond recognition by effects of the environment and decay. Usually, layman and forensic methods (e.g. fingerprint identification) and, in case of the absence of evidence, also medical methods are used for post mortem identification. A method very rarely used in practice is the identification of the deceased through the implants. The described case concerned a finding of a decomposed body of an unidentified man. During the autopsy, apart from the signs of multiple surgeries, a dynamic hip screw implant with a well identifiable serial number was found. Based on this number, health care facilities were traced back in which such an implant had been used, and through studying the documentation of 117 cases, a male patient was finally identified whose other autopsy findings matched the clinical finding. Without the excellent cooperation of orthopaedists and medical examiners, the man would most likely remain unidentified. Key words: identification, autopsy for identification purposes, bone implants, dynamic hip screw.

[Frangible bullets: wounding capability and clinical aspects of their use]. / Strely frangible: ranivost a klinické aspekty jejich pouzití

The article deals with basic characteristics of the frangible bullets and it documents a very specific behaviour of chosen types of these bullets in testing blocks as a substitute materials of alive tissues. The frangible bullets have several important advantages compared to the classical sorts of firearms bullets. The highest benefit could be seen especially in the limited penetrating capability and very low ricochet hazard connected with the use of these bullets. The absence of poisonous elements in the material of frangible bullets (for instance lead) is highly appreciated from the ecology reasons nowadays as well. The cartridges assembled with frangible bullets are used most of all for the practise reasons by law enforcement units, but can be used very effectively also in combat situations. Results of own shooting experiments confirm that the wound potential of bullet can be changed in a very large extent with the change of the manufacturing technology and the bullets geometry. Newly developed frangible bullets and the already manufactured bullets available on the market are characterized by very specific terminal ballistic features. Some frangible bullets behave in a comparable way to full metal jacketed bullets while penetrating soft tissues. Another frangible bullets of different designs fragment to the pieces in soft tissues and cause very serious wounds with persistent effects. The usage of frangible bullets and a potential risk of misuse of this specific sort of ammunition require also new approaches in the medicine for the treatment of the gunshot wounds.

[The correlation of results of breath analysers and laboratory blood examinations of blood-ethanol concentration (Czech and Slovak study)]. / Mezirepubliková Cesko-Slovenská studie korelace výsledku dechových analyzátoru a výsledku laboratorní analýzy pri zjistování hladiny alkoholu v krvi.

The target of this study was to compare the results of breath analysers and "lege artis" laboratory blood examinations when determining alcohol levels. This was then used to determine whether any differences exist between the two methods, and how large these differences are. 610 cases from 11 workplaces in the Czech Republic and Slovakia were analysed. The type of breath analyser was not taken into consideration. All cases had to be in the elimination phase. Difference of time between breath test and blood test were rectified through the use of reverse recomputation. It was detected that only 20.8% of the results of respiratory analyser tests correspond to the detected real alcohol level in blood. The maximum difference when a respiratory analyser measured more than a blood test was 1.34 g x kg(-1). and the maximum difference when the analyse measured less was 1.86 g x kg(-1).

The effect of the home shooting percussion pistol on skull substitute bones.

The aim of this paper was to determine if the saloon percussion pistol, considered to be a non-lethal weapon, can in fact be dangerous to life even if the neucranium is hit elsewhere than the so-called "locus minoris resistentiae" areas. In the face of specialist opinion that states that life-threatening or serious injury can occur only after a shot to the sensitive parts of the head (eyes, ears, sinus, nasal and oral cavity), it was experimentally determined on replacement materials that if the gun is loaded with just 100mg of gun powder a 4.5mm calibre bullet always penetrates the cranium. Saloon percussion pistols can be dangerous to life in situations that nobly expected till now.

[Fundamental biological model for trials of wound ballistics]. / Základní biologický model pro zkousky ranivé balistiky.

The aim of our experiment was the testing of effects of common ammunition on usable and slightly accessible biological tissue thereby to create fundamental simple biological model for trials of wounded ballistic. Like objective tissue was elected biological material - pork and beef hind-limbs, pork head, pork bodily cavity. It was discovered that objective tissue is able to react to singles types of shots in all spectrum results namely simple smooth penetration wound as well as splintery fracture in dependence on kind of using ammunition. Pork hind-limb was evaluated like the most suitable biological material for given object.

[Postmortem analysis of the group of patients treated with implantable electronic medical devices--study design]. / Postmortální analýza souboru nemocných lécených implantabilními prístroji--usporádání studie.

The purpose of this article is to present the aim of analysis of the group of patients treated with implantable electronic medical devices and to address pathologists who could possibly like to participate in the project. The number of implantable devices has been growing up--estimated number of annual increase in the number of implanted pacemakers recently has been about 225 000 just in the USA, number of implantable cardioverter-defibrillators is similarly increasing. Number of pacemaker implantations in Czech Republic was 4590 in 1995, in 2001 6025 patients. Number of ICD implantations in Czech Republic in 1995 was 60 patients, in 2004 650 patients. The aetiology of death depends on type of device--in group of patients with implantable cardioverter-defibrillators it is mostly cardiac death, in group of patients with pacemaker dominate non-cardiac death. Recent data shows assumption of malfunctions in 3-15 %. Post-mortem evaluation of electronic medical devices should be standard praxis.