Autopsy

[jilly]

Maybe she was just getting ready to shower or she was getting out of the shower - maybe she was just getting ready to run and was changing from pj's or whatever she slept in - I dunno.

But her clothing (lack of clothing) doesn't really say to me that someone else tried to put it on her honestly.

Fair enough. I can't think anymore :crazy: so better say:bedtime:G'nite!:blowkiss:

 

[SleuthyGal]

G'night Jilly!

I feel so sad that Nancy was left (essentially) nude, out on the side of that drainage embankment, like a piece of garbage, left to rot. What a horrible end and with no dignity.

 

[raisincharlie]

I would ask what time her usual 'early am' Saturday jogs were.
If she often left around 6 am, that very well could be the case.
....assuming he 1st went to the HT at 6:15 am after dumping the body.

It was Brad himself who commented in his original affidavit that Nancy was scheduled to run the day before with Carey Clark at 5:45 am. Line 175 by the way. Maybe weekends were different but considering she had a time to be at a friends house at 8 am - a 7 am run seems unrealistic, especially since no watch was reported as being found on her body. Strange she would go at 7am IMO.

 

[CyberPro]

Recall the saying -"hindsight is 20/20" ?

Any actions after the murder and disposal would be hindsight. Brad didn't think anyone would notice he was wearing different shoes on his second trip to HT either - the devil is in the details, obviously he wasn't thinking about small details.

Nope, this seems to be something of a common thread in a lot of cases. I can understand it to a degree. Just like many situations that have a lot of emotional content, time passes in a very strange way.

I am not sure what you might have experienced in your personal life, but if you are shocked about something strongly or are experiencing something else with a lot of emotion in some ways it seems that time flys by very quickly, OTOH, you might find that you have looked at your watch 3 times in the last 10 minutes. Other times, you stop for 5 minutes, but the clock says 2 hours have passed. This can happen if you receive word of the sudden death of a loved one, or perhaps the birth of a baby that you are involved with.

If BC did this, and did not have it planned out in great detail, he was shocked and working as quickly as possible to cover the tracks, get rid of the evidence and he had to get this done before the kids woke up! Wow, he would have had a busy morning! He has to figure out where to put the body, lay some false trails, clean the house... in this situation, I think the calls to him about HT were pretty inspired.

I lean strongly towards the TOD being between 1 and 2 AM, due to the amount of things he had to get done, and I think that unless it was preplanned for weeks, he probably had to take some time to get a grip and figure out what he was going to do.

Another point, the killer has to do all of these tasks under great stress and a short period of time. They think they have covered all of the bases, but LE has ALL THE TIME IN THE WORLD to examine everything in minute detail. I would think it is nearly impossible to get away with killing someone close to you, since you are going to be a suspect almost automatically. This does not always apply to a stranger killing someone, most of the time they get caught because the cannot keep their mouth shut.

CyberPro

 

[raisincharlie]

Nope, this seems to be something of a common thread in a lot of cases. I can understand it to a degree. Just like many situations that have a lot of emotional content, time passes in a very strange way.

I am not sure what you might have experienced in your personal life, but if you are shocked about something strongly or are experiencing something else with a lot of emotion in some ways it seems that time flys by very quickly, OTOH, you might find that you have looked at your watch 3 times in the last 10 minutes. Other times, you stop for 5 minutes, but the clock says 2 hours have passed. This can happen if you receive word of the sudden death of a loved one, or perhaps the birth of a baby that you are involved with.

If BC did this, and did not have it planned out in great detail, he was shocked and working as quickly as possible to cover the tracks, get rid of the evidence and he had to get this done before the kids woke up! Wow, he would have had a busy morning! He has to figure out where to put the body, lay some false trails, clean the house... in this situation, I think the calls to him about HT were pretty inspired.

I lean strongly towards the TOD being between 1 and 2 AM, due to the amount of things he had to get done, and I think that unless it was preplanned for weeks, he probably had to take some time to get a grip and figure out what he was going to do.

Another point, the killer has to do all of these tasks under great stress and a short period of time. They think they have covered all of the bases, but LE has ALL THE TIME IN THE WORLD to examine everything in minute detail. I would think it is nearly impossible to get away with killing someone close to you, since you are going to be a suspect almost automatically. This does not always apply to a stranger killing someone, most of the time they get caught because the cannot keep their mouth shut.

CyberPro

So you think it took hours to carry a body out of the house, put it in the car and drive less than 2 miles away to dump the body ? I don't get that - not being so close to his home, not being in an area he was absorbed in on a day to day basis. Doesn't fly with me. He didn't drive any significant distance, he didn't even try to hide the body, it was clearly out in the open. Very little effort involved in this, very little time.

Since we now know COD - we now also know there would not have been a huge bloody mess to clean up, no blood spattered walls, no weapons to dispose of. He admits to cleaning the very morning she went missing. What all would he have had to clean given the COD ? What would he have cleaned with that he would have had to cart somewhere to dispose of? Not a lot really and certainly nothing that would have required disposal at a location of significant distance.

As to the invention of a phone call - given his line of work, seems this thought would have been second nature to him and not one requiring any real study to come up with. I totally disagree this took hours or any great thought afterwards. I also disagree that he would have had to taken time to get a grip - this guy is colder than frozen peas. But you are right, LE has lots of time to look and they will. Spousal murders are not always easily solved, for obvious reasons - DNA is often to be expected, which means the strongest evidence available to a DA may well be a mute point.

Given the lack of stomach contents - either Nancy ate nothing at the neighborhood party, especially no meat, or she was murdered much later than 1 am.

 

[momto3kids]

I still feel NC was murdered shortly after coming home. We don't know exactly when she got home, just after midnight per BC affidavit.

The strongest most compelling to me is the red fluid, but also the other things I have noted.

The red fluid is most likely wine. If it were blood it would have been noted by the ME. Below is a link referring UP to 2 hours to complete absorption. Possible wine still in the stomach puts this within 2 hours if not sooner after her last cup of wine.

Onion takes longer to exit the stomach. Link below. Meat was obviously not noted per autopsy, so this would answer why a possible piece of onion remained. Stomach contents usual are emptied within 6 hrs. She eats ribs at sometime between 6-8pm, stomach empty between 12- 2am. This 6 hour rule has been a rule of thumb for the last 30 yrs I worked in surgery. Anyone who has ever had a procedure is told nothing to eat or drink after midnight.

Brownish green vegetable material IMO is vomit. Again, the link states vegetable take longer to exit. DD is big on vegetable dishes as she has posted. I feel it would have been stated vegetation. Unless vomit is immediate once it has been in the stomach with other contents and stomach acid it will be brownish green. At least that is all the vomit I have unfortuanetly witnessed.

Possible wine still in stomach, within 2 hours of last glass or sooner. Possible vomit of vegetables, within 6 hours of last bite. IMO she was murdered between 1-3am.

When large amounts of alcohol are consumed over a short time interval, or when a large quantity of food is eaten with the alcohol, the absorption phase may not be complete for up to two (2) hours after last consumption.
http://www.forcon.ca/learning/alcohol.html

Some foods such as celery, onion, potato, corn and tomato skins typically take longer than meat or other foods to exit the stomach.
http://www.scribd.com/doc/2671189/time-of-death-atlas

Normally patients are fasted for 2 hours after clear fluids and 6 hours following a meal before they are anesthetised. This is to reduce the chance of any residual food remaining within the stomach.
http://www.nda.ox.ac.uk/wfsa/html/u04/u04_003.htm

 

[SleuthyGal]

Good info, Mto3K.

 

[Daphne69]

Given the lack of stomach contents - either Nancy ate nothing at the neighborhood party, especially no meat, or she was murdered much later than 1 am.

I'm just not sure if I totally buy this. I would think she wouldn't eat much if anything after returning to the party from taking the kids home. I don't see a lot of women at parties eating a lot late into the evening. Usually, it's eat a short while after arriving (or when dinner is ready) and then drinks for the rest of the evening.

I checked around and kept seeing 3-4 hours for meat to leave the stomach. So, if NC quit eating around 8 or 8:30 (totally plausible if she wasn't feeling as well as reported), then an empty stomach wouldn't conflict with TOD being 1 or 2 or 3 am.

 

[raisincharlie]

I'm just not sure if I totally buy this. I would think she wouldn't eat much if anything after returning to the party from taking the kids home. I don't see a lot of women at parties eating a lot late into the evening. Usually, it's eat a short while after arriving (or when dinner is ready) and then drinks for the rest of the evening.

I checked around and kept seeing 3-4 hours for meat to leave the stomach. So, if NC quit eating around 8 or 8:30 (totally plausible if she wasn't feeling as well as reported), then an empty stomach wouldn't conflict with TOD being 1 or 2 or 3 am.

I'm not much for making assumptions about what people do - such as how late they might eat at a party, consumption of snacks, or drink. For all we know she could have got up that morning and drank tomato juice... just saying, we don't know. But what I do know is the half life of caffine and it doesn't add up for me.

 

[RaleighNC]

I agree that she was murdered shortly after she arrived home. I suspect that the topics of conversation during the party would shed some light as to her frame of mind - and that information has not been made public, but I am also thinking that she gained some strength by being around her friends at the party, drinking (liquid courage) and when she came home and he was pissed - she was less likely to shrink back and not get into an argument.

I can't see Brad either sleeping and then waking up mad enough to kill her, or stewing all night long and then killing her without a TON more noted trauma and violence on the ME's report.

Is it possible that she slept in the jog type bra when she was sleeping with the girls? What if she came home and didn't want to wake them - would she go sleep in a guest room and not feel comfortable or not have access to her usual nightclothes? Perhaps she grabbed a few clean things out of the laundry and went to the guest room and that is where the fight ensued.

Many unanswered questions from the night of the party. (Obviously) but ones that address her state of mind and what she talked to her friends about, etc. are especially intriguing - esp since she had noted he was back in hate mode. Their relationship had to be a topic of conversation that night.

 

[Daphne69]

I'm not trying to say that I don't think she did have anything to eat after X time. I'm just saying that an empty stomach doesn't rule out being killed earlier than 5 or 6.

As for caffeine, I think that's the same kind of guess. Just because there's caffeine doesn't mean we know when or in what form she ingested it. Could be coffee, medication, energy drink, etc. Maybe it was from the party, maybe from that morning. Believing that it was morning, makes the same assumptions about what someone would do. BTW, what is the half-life?

Bottomline for me is that I agree with RaleighNC. I find it hard to believe that BC went to sleep and then woke up with enough anger to kill her first thing. I also find it hard to believe (but, admittedly, not impossible) that he stayed up all night arguing or stewing and then killed her around 5. That's a REALLY long time to keep that kind of energy up IMHO.

 

[Star12]

Just my observations, opinions, and remembrances:

1. White tee shirt - BC said Nancy called out to him asking where it was. I think he said that because he knew she wasn't wearing a shirt.

2. Earring - I have pulled more than one post out of my ear pulling shirts etc. on/off.

3. Shoes - Yeah, betcha those blue/gray shoes were Nancy's usual running shoes. LE knew she was without shoes.

4. Rest of clothing - BC found out just how difficult it was to dress a corpse since he started with the jog bra - gave it up as a bad job and decided not to do the rest of the clothing. It's hard enough to dress an unwilling child, or an infant. An adult body would be more difficult. And then he figured that it would look more like she had been attacked by a stranger if she was without significant clothing and left in an isolated location.

5. I think Nancy was killed in the bedroom. LE took bed linen with unidentified stains. The deceased no longer has control of their body, and releases fluids. This would necessitate laundry-doing. Perhaps he missed a linen. And then, perhaps vomitus in the trunk - that had to be cleaned. BC had a whole lot of cleaning to do. Just no blood.

6. Eating at the party - IIRC Nancy brought the ribs, but didn't eat them. Didn't DD post on her blog at one point that at another of her earlier dinner parties that she was serving ribs, but Mrs. C couldn't eat them, so she had to make something else for her?

7. Whose bedroom? - It was told in one affidavit that Nancy had slept in the girls room with her clothing on, and with her keys. IMHO, this was not something that she did as a habit. I think she might have done it once or twice a while back, but not recently. She did have her own bedroom, and her keys were found downstairs.

8. And what about that piece of green plastic LE put in an envelope - Murder weapon?

9. TOD - I dunno. BC says lights were on at 4 am. Maybe they fought in the dark for a while - could have happened in the dark and he turned the lights on afterwards. And certainly Katie could have awakened because of the commotion, and BC diverted her attention in his office, to keep her from awakening Bella. Or Katie didn't awaken, and BC was in the office, on his computer, looking up where and how to dispose of the body, or how to clean the evidence, or????

So far I have seen nothing to specifically exonerate BC or cause doubt as to his culpability. And the autopsy falls right in line with that thinking. It's difficult to think of a person killing another person, but I can't shake the feeling that BC should be indicted and stand trial.

 

[momto3kids]

8. And what about that piece of green plastic LE put in an envelope - Murder weapon?

Star...this is the one that really has me stumped. We don't know the size of the envelope, a letter size envelope of manila envelope? We don't know if it was a strong heavy plastic as in wrapping the body for transport or hard plastic such as a lid to something.

We know she didn't have any lacerations for the hard plastic to cause her harm. What would be large enough to wrap her in that is green plastic?

I will admit I am stumped by this one.

Maybe it had a print or fluid on it that was suspicious? But it said a piece was taken. IDK

 

[jmflu]

6. Eating at the party - IIRC Nancy brought the ribs, but didn't eat them. Didn't DD post on her blog at one point that at another of her earlier dinner parties that she was serving ribs, but Mrs. C couldn't eat them, so she had to make something else for her? - Star

I just read it today, and it stated that Nancy would have loved them.

 

[raisincharlie]

I'm not trying to say that I don't think she did have anything to eat after X time. I'm just saying that an empty stomach doesn't rule out being killed earlier than 5 or 6.

As for caffeine, I think that's the same kind of guess. Just because there's caffeine doesn't mean we know when or in what form she ingested it. Could be coffee, medication, energy drink, etc. Maybe it was from the party, maybe from that morning. Believing that it was morning, makes the same assumptions about what someone would do. BTW, what is the half-life?

Bottomline for me is that I agree with RaleighNC. I find it hard to believe that BC went to sleep and then woke up with enough anger to kill her first thing. I also find it hard to believe (but, admittedly, not impossible) that he stayed up all night arguing or stewing and then killed her around 5. That's a REALLY long time to keep that kind of energy up IMHO.

Guess that is my point - no way do the 6 or 7 pages of this report provide any real information that us peons can readily use. I have assumed nothing - the fact is in the report, red liquids were all that were found in the stomach. This says zero about TOD in reality with the way it is presented. Caffine was found as well. I take exception to the vomit theory however with respect to the brown green vegetable matter found somewhere on the 325. It makes zero sense to me that someone could selectively upchuck solids but yet the stomach retains red liquids with no mention of brown green vegetable matter being at least minutely being present.

I don't find it hard to believe, given the info in the LE affidavits about fighting all day the day before, that Brad could have gone to sleep and woke up the next morning in a ticked mood. This is somewhat supported by the reported history of events as far back as April - he was quite capable of doing nothing even when angry and obviously, he was rather angry in April. I also don't find it hard to believe Nancy was in no mood for it and talked back about it. I don't find it hard to believe things escalated either. I have seen nothing to rule this potential out just as I have seen nothing to rule out that she was murdered earlier. However I do have a tendency to look at numerous things at one time and see a connection. The connections I see are saying to me she was murdered closer to 6 am than to midnight. There is a reason that Brad's lawyers wanted the autopsy and the ME's notes, and it wasn't obviously for Brad to say she was in her running clothes such as he described...

 

[jmflu]

It's possible they stayed up all night long arguing and THEN he killed her closer to 6 am. They may have never gone to bed, but still not have her dead right after she got home.

 

[reddress58]

I wonder if there was any way ME could test the amount of salt on her jog bra from evaporated sweat. If she didn't go running, very little would be on her top.

 

[jmflu]

I wonder if there was any way ME could test the amount of salt on her jog bra from evaporated sweat. If she didn't go running, very little would be on her top.

Interesting thought... but if she fought him in that top, she would have perspired in it...

 

[reddress58]

Interesting thought... but if she fought him in that top, she would have perspired in it...

If it were CSI Miami, they would re-enact both scenarios and measure diiferent amounts of sweat produced, and then compare.

 

[momto3kids]

I've been thinking about lights on in BC home. In the front corner of their property is a steet light and directly behind their home on Lochmere Drive is one. This is from GOOGLE, not my checking. From what I have seen in past pictures they don't pull their blinds downstairs closed. I am sure there was enough light to get around downstairs and maybe what rooms upstairs are not being slept in. Those 2 lights gave him the only light he needed IMO.

Watching the media in the beginning go to his front door he didn't have the glass covered until later for privacy. With no glass in the garage doors he could get around with a light on and no one would have known.

We have a street light in front of our home in our cul-de-sac across the street and I can get around with no problem upstairs and downstairs. We actually have to close our bedroom (back of house)door because the light comes in our 2 story entrance and is annoying.

4am? Dealing with Bella, dealing with the body or trying to clean up his god awful mess he made. IMO