“We don’t know when she died,” Lawrence Kobilinsky, a forensic scientist and professor emeritus of forensic science at John Jay College of Criminal Justice, told The Daily Beast. “But we do know that she’s in an environment that’s very hot. You can get decomposition in a matter of a week.”
Pinpointing a cause of death would be the responsibility of the coroner, who will make a call as to which of five categories the death corresponds to: homicide, accident, suicide, natural causes, or undetermined. “The likelihood is high that he’ll declare it a homicide,” Kobilinsky said. “This is a healthy 22-year-old that went missing under mysterious circumstances.”
Even if the remains are mostly skeletal, a coroner would look for an impression in the skull or the fracturing of the hyoid bone in the neck—signs that would point to blunt force trauma and manual strangulation, respectively.
It’s also unknown what other evidence authorities have gathered—from the van, from the scene of death, from the couple’s devices—that could help investigators determine when and how Petito died.
How Did Gabby Petito Die? Answering That May Be Complicated
