The effect of remaining in water in estimation of time since death in skeletal remains

Abstract

Determining the time since death of an individual from skeletal remains is a challenging stage. In determination of time since death, climate conditions, environmental factors, conditions such as whether the body was buried or not, and genetic and personal factors must be evaluated all together. With these factors changing and with the exposure duration growing longer, changes occur in the morphology of the bone might increase. In this study, as part of an investigation, bones which had been found in a water-well during an excavation work in Mardin was used. After 36 pieces of bone that belong to a human were analyzed, it was found that the bones had lost most of their weight and density, that they were considerably fragile, that their medulla was emptied, and that there were intense erosions on the surfaces of bony tissue. While under normal circumstances and under the condition that it was a buried body it would take at least 50 years for these changes to occur, considering that the bones remained in water for a very long time, the corrosion had to be much more than expected. With the DNA comparison, it was found that the bones belonged to people who were claimed to have been killed in the 90’s. In this study, it was aimed to determine the time of death of remains which were reported to have stayed in contact with water, and to study the effect of the environmental circumstances in which the bodies are found on the bones. [Med-Science 2017; 6(1.000): 139-43]

Keywords

• Forensic
• time since death
• water effect
• skeletal remains
• environmental conditions