What is the sickest thing you've seen?

[Aussie George]

I had a guy who sat under a porch, placed the barrel of a Thomspon Contender with .30 cal in his mouth and crossed the great divide.

The top half of his cranium sheared off along the lateral line of a baseball cap he had been wearing. The top of his head shattered and there was high velocity spatter of blood, brains, hair, etc., all over the bottom of the patio ceiling.

What was really neat, was that the thick band of the baseball cap had ripped loose in the fabric area, and the plastic adjustment band at the rear was intact.

I thought this was cool and asked the ID Tech to get a close up photo to show the power of the kinetic energy to rip through the thick fabric.

As the ID Tech was ducking down to get a close-up, a large piece of brain succumbed to gravity and fell from the patio onto the back of her neck.

The look I got from her was sicker than the scene. Yep, that look was the sickest thing I have seen. :D

Lord I apologise, at laughing at that one, but I couldn't help it.:D

[sgtbear111]

Early in my career, before crime scene tape was invented, when we carried Colt Pythons in swivel holsters, I was called to assist another Deputy with a death investigation.. On arrival I saw the other officer waving me to park by him, pointing to the ground by his feet. This was in a partly harvested corn field, and that means mid to late August. There was a corn harvester/combine stopped in a partially cut row.

I contacted the other Deputy. He was doing the paper on this case, but wanted me to get more photos. He said "we are upwind of it". I walked over to the farm machine and found the farmer recognized what he was about to run over, stopped, and called the SO. I saw a corpse that was about what you would expect after 4-5 days in the hot weather, moderated slightly by the tall corn. It was green, black, leaking, and had that stench that keeps you in the shower for an hour after leaving your uniforms on the porch. Wind was from the NW at 5 to 10. I stayed upwind but got closer for some pics. An eddy or swirl of the wind came around the corn picker and I got a full blast of "eau-de-morte". This dead guy was getting ready to pop, the bugs were hovering, waiting. Closer to lunch than breakfast so I kept my dignity, shot some film, and went back to the other Deputy. "Nice huh?" was his greeting.

We held position for the crime scene search team to arrive and go over the site. Position of the body, and surroundings were ambiguous, and this farmer had to get the corn crop in. We all wanted to finish it today.

We were visited by the county Prosecutor who was also the Coroner. An office bound mild mannered lawyer with a weak ticker, and weaker tummy. He came into the field, disregarded our directions, drove past "it" with windows down on this hot day. He never saw the body but his face showed what his nose detected. He was a lighter shade of green than the not so recently departed,. Never got out of the car, he said a death certificate would be filled in when we provided the name and cause of death. We asked if he saw the body, he said the smell was enough to confirm death, put his car in gear and drove like a madman upwind the long way off the field to the safety of the Courthouse. Another lawyer who chose to ignore directions from police officers, he looked a bit "off" the next day. :D

Lunchtime. We two hungry officers got on the tac channel and asked another deputy to get us some burgers, fries ,and a couple shakes. We told that officer to come in upwind, the short route. He delivered and left, avoiding witnessing or asking about anything. Court time wasn't his thing.

Halfway thru lunch, another unknown car approached. It was the 'cub" reporter from the local news rag of diminishing circulation. He was all a-twitter, saying "where is the body, do we know if it's a murder?" While chewing our hamburgers, speaking impolitely with our mouths full, we said "it's right in front of that tractor thing". The young journalist gets his expensive looking camera out of the hard case, fits a flash, and marches right over there to cover the story. Why? Back then our cameras were crappy Instamatics, a 35mm was personal owned if you carried one. Civilian photographers did traffic fatal photos regularly. Anyway his back was to us, and due to the food interfering with us shouting (uh-hunh), the wiind, or his focus, he didn 't hear us say "stay upwind", He spots the body and practically ran up to it bringing up his camera during the approach. He stopped like he was pole-axed, the camera dropped from his hands, and hung somewhere in front of him by the neck cord. We saw his back lurch, shudder, and he turned towards us. His camera was wearing his lunch, and his shirt and tie got it's share. He came back to us with a withered look. My partner spoke to him thru a mouth full of fries "pretty stinky huh?" with a big grin. I had just stuffed the last of my cheseburger in. The young news hawk looked at us eating and unloaded the remainder of lunch onto his camera. Don't know if the tears were from anger or dry heaves, we didn't ask, but ours were from laughter. I was laughing so hard that I spit my burger out to keep from choking. The young man got into his car, camera still slung over his neck, and departed the same exit route, same speed, as the previous visitor.

The crime scene folks arrived, nothing found to indicate homicide, Learned about Vapo-Rub when we had to get him into a body bag. The funeral home guy knew his business. Thus the need to take a long shower. The tox screen showed a number & very high likely lethal quantity of illicit drugs.. Paraphernalia was found nearby. Post showed no trauma or external causes. There was a report of a lone hitch-hiker, similar description, possibly
"disoriented", on the freeway 1/2 mile north of this corn field.several days priior. Responding units UTL. We could book hitchhikers back then for walking on a limited access. He may have ducked into the field, thus the UTL.

Anyone ever figure out why you get hungry after working a death scene?

[Valor55]

Great story!

Anyone ever figure out why you get hungry after working a death scene?

Usually because I'm on my way to eat when I get that call. By the time it's wrapped up I'm starving!!!

[Cat_Doc]

Anyone ever figure out why you get hungry after working a death scene?

I don't know the answer to this, Sarge, but it is a common occurrence, especially with "stinkers." Strange, isn't it?

[Cat_Doc]

Sarge's post reminds me of another incident in which I laughed my butt off, at another detective's expense.

I had a very, very attractive female homicide detective on my squad and we both responded to a terrible "stinker" call. We spent several hours inside the house, enough time to get used to the smell.

Well, when we cleared the scene and were heading back to HQ to put some items in the evidence locker, we stopped at a small convience store to get a cold soda.

As we first walked in the store, I saw the male clerk admiring the young detective.

We were getting our drinks and she tried to take my cup saying she would pay for it. I told her no thanks, and stalled for a few seconds because I knew the rotten dead body smell was on our clothes and wanted to watch the clerk's face when she went to the counter to pay for it.

I stood back a few feet and could see the admiration (lust?) in the clerk's eyes as she walked up.

I also noticed the distinct moment when the clerk caught a whiff of the dead body odor. :eek:

Now, some of the real cops in here know that you learn the ability to keep a straight face even though something is hilarious, like another cop messing with a dumb *** on the street.

I tried my best, but couldn't hold it.

I busted out and when she realized what it was about, I got a rather assaultive strike to the shoulder, numerous times on the way back to HQ.

The look on that clerk's face was priceless. :D

[danninator]

One of my first weeks into the fire department we were sitting outside the station talking. A bus pulls up, man steps off with headphones off, walks into highway not fully paying attention and is hit by a car going at least 60mph, goes underneath car then hit by pickup, then cuaght under a third car dragging his body about 50 yards. His head was in a different area than the rest of him and the medical examiner pulled out his intestines like spaghetti wrapping them up and putting them into a bag.

The saddest part was we(fire dept called out for a lighting assignment) found his ID intact and could see what he originally looked like. Truly shocking to see felt like slow motion.

[mcsap]

A DOA down 2 weeks in 80-90+ temps. It was the 2nd floor of an apt. building. Neighbors called to complain of a " foul odor" and their elderely neighbor they hadn't seen in a " while".

We had to force entry and I found him in his bed. He was a white male that had turned completely BLACK. His body had swelled, their were maggots crawling all over him and his bodily fluids had leaked out all over the bed/floor.

It was truly a Noxema monent !

[CincyCop]

This is by no means much compared to the posts above. I responded to an atl (attempt to locate) call. The neighbor was worried about the neighbor. I entered the house which was wide open and found a doa in the bedroom. The doa had probably been passed away for about a month. Called the supervisor, called the coroner's office, etc. Supervisor arrived and now it's time to turn the body for pictures. Being the rookie, it's my job to turn the body. PFFFFFFFFT. Gas escapes while turning the body.

HOLY SMOKES!!!

I lost it, dropped the body, sprinted to the front yard and yarched BIG TIME right in front of the neighbors!

My supervisor was not impressed.

[scott715us]

Actually one of the grossest things I've seen since working Rescue & LE is a freakin brown recluese spider bite. Nothing worse than rotting skin...

[Valor55]

Bump. Great thread.

[Norm357]

I saw Rosie Odonell once. Yuck.

[Bail_Agent]

An EMT friend of mine said he arrived at a drug house (after the raid, they were called) and a man had been constipated so much, feces were coming out of his mouth.

I dunno. I don't believe it.

[Slowspeed]

The funnest and grossest thing I ever saw was a gung ho volunter fireman jumping on a heart attack call.

While doing mouth to mouth the guy threw up IN the volunter fireman's mouth.

I laughed for a damned month.

[acreature]

I saw Rosie Odonell once. Yuck.

You poor Man. I'll send some salt to pour in your eyes. It should feel better than looking at Rosie :D

[acreature]

Arrival within minutes to a suicide call. 15 yr old loaded an old .45 cal side by side pistol with a 4/10 shell and took most of his face and skull off.

Another was an accident (4 of 5 in causing car died) where one victim (illegals) had his face literally left on the guard rail of the bridge.