(*this is blatantly not true)<\/span><\/p>\n The only time I\u2019m really triggered** is when it comes to burned bodies and bone. Because that\u2019s my bag, and if I don\u2019t point out the issues then, well what has been the point of spending 20 years studying it. Exactly. No-one wants to contemplate the pointlessness of their life\u2019s work.<\/p>\n (**this is blatantly not true)<\/span><\/p>\n Which brings me on to last week. Like most people, we\u2019ve been spending vast amounts of time on Netflix and Amazon Prime whiling away the lockdown<\/a>. Inevitably we stumbled upon Lucifer<\/a>, a show based on the work of the excellent Neil Gaiman<\/a> which sees the devil come to earth and help out a detective in her investigations. It\u2019s a weird premise for what is essentially a procedural cop show, but a show about the lord of eternal punishment and damnation seemed appropriate for someone working in HE. Anyway, it\u2019s kind of mindless fun which is what one needs at this time.<\/p>\n The episode in question (s2 ep3 Sin-Eater<\/a>) featured a guy tied to a stake and burned alive as punishment for posting an embarrassing video of someone online. The forensic person (because in these shows there\u2019s only one and they do all of the forensic disciplines…) then examined the body and noted that the burn pattern indicated that the fire started in the crotch region. But it did not. It did not. And when I said this out loud on Twitter<\/a>, I rightly got asked for more detail. So this post is your fault, really***.<\/p>\n (***this is blatantly not true)<\/span><\/p>\n For those of you who don\u2019t know, and the only reason for this would be that you haven\u2019t read my work and so shame on you, the body undergoes a number of heat-induced changes when exposed to fire. The soft tissues (skin and organs) dehydrate, contract and then split. Once the skin is ruptured the internal organs are exposed and then the skeleton and so the changes speed up. The blood will breakdown and change colour. The skeleton also changes, first in terms of colour and then through fracturing and changes to the crystal structure. The situation is further complicated by the interactions of all of these variables. For example, work led by Dr Sarah Ellingham<\/a> and published in the Journal of Forensic Sciences showed that in low temperature events the soft tissues act as a buffer to slow down heat-induced change, but in higher temp events it acts as a fuel and speeds up such changes<\/a>.<\/p>\n There is much to unpick from this short scene so I\u2019ve popped a few screen grabs of the episode right here for you:<\/p>\n So what are our initial thoughts? Well, the things that whizzed through my mind were:<\/p>\n I don\u2019t know about you, but I feel better for getting all of this off my chest. And here we have another example of something I\u2019ve spoken about before, which is using TV shows and movies in our teaching to help illustrate points and kick-start discussions. Anyway, if you take nothing else away from this, remember this forensic science 101 lesson:<\/p>\n One day, I will learn not to post a glib tweet about a TV show right before bed. But that day will not be anytime soon as we all know that I like the attention… When it comes to forensic science on TV shows, I\u2019m usually pretty zen*. Like a leaf in the wind. I know that some artistic licence is needed because this is entertainment, and much forensic analysis is visually rather boring. And slow. I\u2019ve even advised TV shows myself so that they…<\/span>Continue Reading ““Do not touch the charred crotch””<\/span> ![\"\"](\"https:\/\/blogs.tees.ac.uk\/tjuthompson\/files\/2020\/08\/Lucifier_body-1024x770.jpg\")
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