Category Archives: Forensics

IS MISSING MALAYSIA AIRLINES FLIGHT 370 A MASS MURDER?

What really happened to missing Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 is aviation’s great mystery. On March 8, 2014, the doomed Boeing 777-200ER left Kuala Lumpur bound for Beijing, China with 239 souls on board—227 passengers and 12 crew members. They never made it. Five years later, their disappearance remains unexplained. Either it’s a tragic accident of unprecedented proportions or MAS370 is a mass murder.

Malaysia Air Flight 370 (also called MH370) routinely lifted off KUL runway 32R at 12:42 am local time. The jetliner headed north-northeast for a 5.5-hour trip crossing the South China Sea towards Vietnam and on a course for China’s capital city. Its predicted arrival was 6:10 am with Beijing being in the same time zone as Kuala Lumpur.

MAS370’s first 27 minutes appeared normal from Kuala Lumpur Air Traffic Control (ATC) voice and radar records. The last radio transmission between the airliner and ATC Kuala Lumpur was at 1:19 am. This was the pilot acknowledging the controller’s direction to turn over Flight 370’s supervision to Vietnamese airspace at ATC Ho Chi Minh City on the 120.9 radio frequency. The last words from the plane were, “Goodnight. Malaysian three seven zero.”

At this time, the jetliner leveled to a cruising altitude of 35,000 feet with a ground speed of 510 knots. This was normal for the flight. However, at 1:22 am something completely abnormal suddenly occurred. Malaysia Air Flight 370’s transponder stopped, and the plane’s electronic image vanished from ATC Kuala Lumpur’s radar screen.

A vanishing transponder image should raise a red flag and set off alarms. This, however, was an unusual situation because the airplane was at a critical location where it was changing from one Area Control Center (ACC) to another. Coincidentally, it also happened at a moment where the responsible controller at ATC Kuala Lumpur was distracted by another matter and didn’t catch Flight 370’s transponder loss.

But, ATC in Ho Chi Minh noticed the vanishing transponder. They were expecting the flight and knew it was being handed over as it flew into their airspace. What the Vietnamese controller didn’t know was a formal protocol that they were to immediately notify Kuala Lumpur ATC of the issue. Instead, ATC Ho Chi Minh repeatedly tried to radio Flight 370 but got no response. 18 minutes passed after the transponder stopped before ATC Ho Chi Minh telephoned ATC Kuala Lumpur and alerted them to the disappearance.

Hindsight is usually 20/20, but there was considerable confusion—if not incompetence—within both control centers. Kuala Lumpur looked at the issue as being in Vietnamese airspace when it vanished and therefore their jurisdictional problem. Ho Chi Minh viewed it as a Malaysian airliner belonging to them. By 6:10 am, Flight 370 was overdue in Beijing, and it wasn’t until 6:32 am before Kuala Lumpur’s Aeronautical Rescue Coordination Center was notified to begin an emergency response. 5 hours and 10 minutes passed since Flight 370 disappeared from both ATC radar screens.

The Search Begins

The search for Malaysia Air Flight 370 is the most extensive and expensive aviation hunt in history. Officially, the Malaysian government headed the search and the subsequent investigation. Unofficially, Australia took the lead because of their resource capabilities of searching the air and the sea. Many countries joined in including the United States, France, Great Britain, China, Vietnam, and Thailand.

Between March 08 and April 28, the combined forces involved 19 naval vessels and 347 aerial sorties. They crisscrossed 1,800,000 square miles of ocean and land surface as well as examining a seafloor area with sonar and bathymetric methods. Not a trace of the plane was found during that period.

Initially, the search focused on the location where the transponder contact stopped. From there, the searchers followed a logical path along the airplane’s destined route of approximately 38° northeast over the South China Sea. It took approximately a week until an investigation into radar records showed something drastically different.

The aviation industry and national defense forces use two radar types. One is primary radar that sends a signal that “pings” or bounces off an object like a plane. When struck by a primary radar wave, the aircraft has no choice but to be seen. Primary radar is the preferred choice of all military installations. The enemy can’t hide except under stealth conditions.

Civilian air traffic controllers like the secondary radar system. This involves cooperating airplanes volunteering a data-rich signal through their on-board transponders. A transponder signal gives the controller vital details like the crafts identity, its altitude, flight plan, speed and so forth. The problem with secondary radar and transponder signals is they can be voluntarily turned off.

It was soon evident Flight 370’s transponder was intentionally disabled. Primary radar images and records obtained from the Thai, Viet and Malaysian military showed 370 stayed in the sky for a long time after its transponder stopped. Military radar proved Flight 370 made an abrupt left turn immediately after the secondary civilian radar lost the track. Flight 370 turned into an extremely sharp bank towards the southwest and flew on an approximately 230° course back over Malaysia and to Kuala Lumpur’s northwest.

Thai and Malaysian military radar records showed Flight 370 passing over the island of Penang at 1:52 heading out and over the Strait of Malacca. Just past Penang, Flight 370 again altered course to a west-northwest bearing of approximately 275°. This alteration avoided crossing Indonesia. The last primary contact was at 2:22 am when Flight 370 left the outer limits of the Malaysian military’s radar. At that time, the plane was at 29,500 feet, traveling at 491 knots and located 285 miles northwest of the Penang military installation.

This might have been the last radar contact with Malaysia Air Flight 370. But, it was far from the last time it was tracked. Two minutes after flying off primary radar, the airplane automatically connected with a communications satellite which continued to monitor the plane until 8:19 am. That’s 6 hours and 57 minutes after the transponder went silent.

The Inmarsat Satellite Information

The satellite was a British-based Inmarsat-3F1 in geostatic orbit above the Indian Ocean. The Boeing 777 was equipped with an Aeronautical Satellite Communication (SATCOM) system that allowed cockpit voice communication and critical in-flight data to be sent from anywhere in the world. Boeing designs these jets to be in constant electronic contact at all times regardless of where they are.

It’s impossible to get lost in a 777, but it’s easy to hide in one—as long as the operator knows what they’re doing. Aside from the transponder going silent at 1:22 am, the aircraft’s electronic systems were also disabled. This lasted until 2:25 am—just after leaving the last grasp of primary radar range from Penang.

The Inmarsat was minding its own business when it got an unsolicited ping from Flight 370’s Satellite Data Unit (SDU). As it’s designed to do, the satellite recognized Flight 370’s “log-on request” and responded with a protocol interrogation process known in the industry as a “handshake”. The plane’s SDU automatically replied to Inmarsat and the plane & satellite entered into an agreement of regular 30-minute interval check-ins. It continued until 8:19 am when contact was permanently broken.

Human monitors at Inmarsat’s ground monitoring station in Perth, Australia immediately recognized an unidentified airplane had unexpectedly contacted them. They made two ground-to-aircraft telephone calls to Flight 370. The plane’s SDU acknowledged both, but no one on board the mysterious jetliner answered.

Inmarsat continued 30-minute “handshake” contacts with Flight 370. At 7:13 am the Perth station tried another ground-to-air phone call. It, too, was unanswered. At 8:19 am there was a log-off interruption from Flight 370 followed by an immediate log-on request and another interruption.

It took a week after Flight 370 disappeared to analyze the full Inmarsat information and put it to use in locating the plane’s final location when it signed-off at 8:19 am. Essentially, the Inmarsat data showed the first contact with Flight 370 right after it left conventional radar range. That was at 2:25 am and the Boeing 777’s location was approximately 300 miles northwest of Penang.

However, in the 3 minutes since going off military radar and connecting with Inmarsat, Flight 370 had drastically altered course. Now the jet was bearing approximately 190° in a south-southwest direction. It had made an 85° left turn once it was off military radar.

Inmarsat technicians spent a lot of effort analyzing data transmitted by Flight 370 in the period they tracked it. This was a difficult chore because the Inmarsat spacecraft was made to communicate with ships and planes, not to track them. They worked with principles called burst time offset (BTO) and burst frequency offset (BFO).

Ultimately, Inmarsat experts calculated a series of Doppler Arcs which gave them a high-probability flight line. By working with Boeing engineers, the team extrapolated information about the plane’s speed and fuel capacity. This allowed them to zero-in on a likely location where Flight 370 exhausted its fuel, extinguished its engines and crashed into the sea.

The suspected crash site was in the Southern Indian Ocean. It was approximately 1,400 miles west of the Australian continent and about the same distance from the northern regions of Antarctica. This is one of the most remote ocean locations on Earth and an area where the seafloor was unexplored.

With this apparently credible military radar and Inmarsat information, the search for Malaysia Air Flight 370 moved from the South China Sea to the rough and hostile waters of the lower Indian Ocean. The Australian Navy did its best to search for the telltale pings from the Boeing’s black boxes, however, the batteries had a 30-day energy period that expired. A private American company conducted a second underwater search but also came up empty-handed.

Debris from Malaysian Flight 370 Washes Up

Despite the massive air and sea search done in the months after Flight 370 vanished, not one scrap of physical evidence surfaced to conclusively prove the plane had, in fact, crashed. That changed in July 2015 when an aircraft component called a “flaperon” washed up on a beach of Reunion Island. This remote volcanic landmass is a French protectorate situated 500 miles east of Madagascar and about 3,000 miles northwest from the calculated crash area.

A flaperon is a component from a jetliner’s trailing wing edge. It’s part of the air-braking system where flaps get lowered to slow the airplane down and give it more lift. French authorities who received the flaperon from Reunion’s shore made a conclusive connection to Flight 370 due to a serial number etched into the metal.

This was the first proof that Flight 370 had crashed. Engineers were able to tell that the flaps were up, or in a non-extended position, when the jet impacted the water. They also concluded from the stress fracture damage that the plane had hit the water at high speed and in a downward, nose-first angle.

Finding a smashed part from Flight 370 was a devastating blow to families of the doomed passengers and flight crew. To this point, some held hope that somehow the plane’s disappearance had some other explanation than crashing and that somehow—somewhere—their loved ones survived and waited rescuing.

Over the following months of 2015 and 2016, more than 20 more demolished parts of the shredded passenger jet were found along Indian Ocean shorelines. Oceanographers familiar with wind, wave, tide and current behavior tend to agree that the washed-up debris pattern was consistent with originating from the previously-calculated crash location.

 

To this date, no bodies or personal effects of the victims have been found. There are no more planned searches, and the official investigations by the Malaysian government, their police and their transportation safety authorities have stopped. All acknowledge that Flight 370 crashed into the Indian Ocean but none make any conclusion of why it happened. The official cause is listed as “Undetermined”.

What Caused Malaysian Air Flight 370 to Crash?

There are many theories about what caused Malaysia Air Flight 370 to crash. Some are far-out conspiracy BS like it being abducted by aliens or stolen by the Russians and parked in a secret hanger in Kamchatka. There are internet posts and podcasts concluding the plane was struck by a meteorite and vaporized. Some part-time sleuths suggest that the Malaysian government who owns the airline ordered it destroyed as part of a cover-up for reasons unknown.

Setting aside the inevitable conspiracy theories that always arise in high-profile events, there are only two reasonable explanations for Flight 370’s erratic behavior and ultimate fate. One is the airplane suddenly experienced a massive depressurization which sent the flight crew into an immediate hypoxia event rendering them oxygen-starved and unable to function. The other theory is that someone very familiar with operating a Boeing 777-200ER intentionally sabotaged the flight that caused 239 human deaths.

The first scenario about catastrophic depressurization is worth exploring. An article in the respected journal Air & Space Magazine analyzes the mechanics of a depressurization event and how they’ve caused fatal air crashes in the past. It’s an interesting exercise in flight science but the article fails to deal with facts like intentionally disabling the transponder precisely when it happened and the erratic flight path which was certainly done by someone manually flying and aggressively handling a large commercial aircraft like a Boeing 777.

That leads to the other theory that a crew member went rogue. Before dismissing this as an impossibility, there are four previously-recorded episodes of a flight crew member intentionally downing their plane and killing their passengers. They are:

  • 1997 — Singapore Silkair Boeing 737
  • 1999 — EgyptAir Flight 990
  • 2013 — LAM Mozambique Airlines Flight 470
  • 2015 — Germanwings Airbus in the French Alps

In these four cases, there was no pre-warning about the perpetrator’s awful intent. In hindsight of the investigation, though, there were signs of a troubled individual and considerable pre-planning. That seems to be the case with Malaysia Air Flight 370.

First Officer Fariq (l) Captain Zaharie (r)

A Boeing 777 on short-haul flights only requires a two-person flight control crew. That’s the pilot-in-command, or captain, and the second-in-command known as the first officer. On fateful Flight 370, the first officer was Fariq Abdul Hamid and the captain was Zaharie Ahmad Shah. In Malaysian custom, they were known as First Officer Fariq and Captain Zaharie.

First Officer Fariq is a highly-unlikely suspect to do anything as horrifying as intentionally crashing his plane and killing his people. Fariq was 27 years old and about to be married. He had flying experience on Boeing 737s and the AirbusA330 but only had 39 hours so far on the big 777. Fariq was a pilot-in-training on the triple-seven and under Captain Zaharie’s direct supervision.

The “Captain-Did-It” Theory

53-year-old Captain Zaharie, on the other hand, was highly experienced. He’d been with Malaysian Airlines for 33 years and had over 18,000 flight hours. A good deal of that time was as pilot-in-command on Boeing 777s. However, in his personal life, Zaharie showed signs of clinical depression and moving toward mental instability. His wife had left him and he was living alone. Much of his off-hours were spent on his home-based computerized flight simulator.

At the request of Malaysian Air and Zaharie’s family, the FBI analyzed the history in Zaharie’s simulator hard drive. They found many plotted flights. One had the exact route fatal Flight 370 took. Zaharie simulated leaving Kuala Lumpur, then reached the radio hand-off position between Malaysian and Vietnamese airspace. Here, he made a hard left-hand turn and followed weigh-points that kept him on an international edge between Malaysia, Vietnam, Cambodia and Thailand. That simulated flight plan effectively kept him from being intercepted by each country’s military fighter planes although he would have known they’d be monitoring him on primary radar.

The simulator also recorded the hard left-hand bank once past Penang and the long, steady line towards Antarctica. There was one distinct difference, though, between this simulated flight and many others Zaharie had in his computer. The others had him landing at a destination and safely debarking. This simulation did not.

Malaysian Airlines Captain Zaharie with his Home Flight Simulator

There’s a reasonable case to be made that Captain Zaharie deliberately planned and carried out his own death and that of 238 innocent people. One big question is how he was able to quickly incapacitate First Officer Fariq, his cabin crew and all the passengers who had access to mobile communication devices. The easy answer is Zaharie sent Fariq out of the cockpit, locked it, then put on his oxygen mask and instantly depressurized the plane.

The theory carries that Zaharie cut the electrical runs and accelerated the aircraft, immediately climbing to 40,000 feet where his panicky occupants would be overcome by a lack of air. In the mass confusion and commotion, it’s unlikely anyone would have thought to make an outside call. At 40,000 feet, the emergency oxygen masks—the yellow cups hanging from the ceiling—would have been useless. Everyone on board that plane would be dead within minutes. Except for Captain Zaharie.

He would be perfectly fine breathing his cockpit reserve air until he was able to descend the plane back to 30,000 feet and re-pressurize the system. He made precise turns to avoid detection and, once off primary radar, he likely re-energized the plane’s electrical runs which set off the SDU’s automatic reboot. Zaharie might not have even known that Inmarsat was following him.

At what time Captain Zaharie’s life was over, we’ll likely never know. Perhaps he stayed awake and enjoyed the long and steady ride toward his doom in the Indian Ocean. It’s almost unfathomable to envision a lone pilot commanding a plane full of death but, then, it’s almost unfathomable to believe this really happened. As for motive—why Zaharie would’ve done this—it’s truly incomprehensible.

It the “Captain-Did-It” theory is wrong, then this is a tragic accident of unprecedented proportions. If the theory is right, undoubtedly the missing Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 is a mass murder.

ELVIS PRESLEY — WHAT REALLY KILLED THE KING OF ROCK ‘N ROLL?

Elvis Presley suddenly dropped in the bathroom of his Graceland mansion on the afternoon of August 16, 1977. Elvis was rushed to Baptist Memorial Hospital in Memphis, Tennessee, where he was pronounced dead, then shipped to the morgue and autopsied the same afternoon. Three days later, the Memphis County coroner issued Elvis Presley’s death certificate stating the cause as hypertensive cardiovascular disease with atherosclerotic heart disease — a heart attack subsequent to high blood pressure and blocked coronary arteries.

It was a rush to judgment. Toxicology results soon identified ten pharmaceutical drugs in Elvis’s system. Codeine was ten times the therapeutic level and the combination of other prescription drugs suggested a poly-pharmacy overdose. This revelation started immediate accusations of a cover-up and conspiracy theories quickly hinted at sinister criminal acts.

Four decades later, modern medicine and forensic science looked at the Presley case facts. The review indicated something entirely different from a heart attack or drug overdose really killed the King of Rock ‘n Roll. It said Elvis Presley accidentally died after long-term complications from earlier traumatic brain injuries (TBIs). TBIs are known as silent, stalking, and patient killers.

Looking back, it’s likely old accidental head injuries triggered events leading to Elvis Presley’s death.

From my experience investigating unexpected and unexplained sudden deaths, the accidental conclusion makes sense when you consider the totality of evidence in Elvis’s death. Setting aside media reports of gross negligence, arm-chair speculation of cover-up, and fan accusations that the King was murdered, there’s a simple and straightforward conclusion based on facts. But before examining the facts and knowing hindsight is 20/20, let’s first look at how coroners conduct sudden and unexplained death investigations.

Coroners are the judge of death. Their responsibility is establishing five main facts surrounding a death. Coroners are not to assign blame or fault. In the Presley case, the five facts determined at the immediate time were:

  1. Identity of Deceased — Elvis Aaron Presley

  2. Time of Death — Approximately 2:00 p.m. on Tuesday, August 16, 1977

  3. Place of Death — 3754 Elvis Presley Boulevard, Memphis, Tennessee

  4. Cause of Death — Heart attack

  5. Means of Death — Chronic heart disease

There’s a distinct difference between Cause of Death and Means of Death. Cause is the actual event. Means is the method in which death happened. Examples are cause being a ruptured aorta with means being a motor vehicle crash, or cause being massive cerebral interruption with means being a gunshot wound to the head.

Once the facts are known, it’s the coroner’s duty to classify the Manner of Death. There are five universal manner of death classifications:

  • Natural

  • Homicide

  • Suicide

  • Accidental

  • Undetermined

Elvis Presley’s death was ruled a natural event, thought at the time being an acute cardiac event from existing cardiovascular disease. If the coroner determined Elvis died from a drug overdose, the ruling would have been accidental. No one ever claimed it was suicide or homicide.

One principle of death investigation is to look for antecedent evidence—preexisting conditions which contributed to the death mechanism or was responsible for causing or continuing a chain of events that led to the death.

Another principle of death investigation is examining the cornerstone triangle of Scene—Body—History. This compiles the totality of evidence or case facts. Given that, let’s look at the evidence and case facts in Elvis Presley’s death.

Scene

Elvis was found on his bathroom floor, face down in front of the toilet. It was apparent he’d instantly collapsed from a sitting position and there was no sign of a distress struggle or attempt to summon help. When the paramedics arrived, Elvis was cold, blue and had no vital signs. Rigor mortis had not set in so he’d probably expired within the hour. He was transported by ambulance to Baptist Memorial Hospital where a vain attempt at resuscitation occurred because “he was Elvis”.

ER doctors declared Elvis dead at 3:16 p.m. He was moved to the morgue where an autopsy was promptly performed. There was no suggestion of suicide or foul play so there was no police investigation. The scene wasn’t photographed, nor preserved, and there was no accounting for what medications or other drugs might have been present at Graceland. There’s no official record of the coroner attending the scene as this was considered an in-hospital death and a routine occurrence.

Body

Elvis was in terrible health. His weight was estimated at 350 pounds—gaining 50 lbs. in the last few months of his life. He was virtually non-functional at the end, being mostly bed-ridden and requiring permanent nursing care. Elvis suffered from an enlarged heart which was twice the size of normal and showed advanced evidence of cardiovascular disease in his coronary vessels, aorta, and cerebral arteries—certainly more advanced than a normal 42-year-old would be. His lungs showed signs of emphysema, although he’d never smoked, and his bowel was found to be twice the length of normal with a partially-impacted stool estimated to be four months old.

Elvis also suffered from hypogammaglobulinemia which is an immune disorder, as well as showed evidence of an autoimmune inflammatory disorder.

Toxicology tested positive for ten separate prescription medications but showed negative for illicit drugs and alcohol. The only alarming pharmaceutical indicator, on its own, was codeine at ten times the prescribed manner but not in lethal range.

History

Elvis was born on January 8, 1935 in Tupelo, Mississippi and had a twin brother who died at birth. As a youth, Elvis was active and healthy which continued during his time in the U.S. military and all through his early performing stage when he was a bundle of energy. He began experimenting with amphetamines, probably to enhance his performances, but shied from alcohol as it gave him violent tendencies.

In 1967, Elvis came under the primary care of Dr. George Nichopoulos who was well-known to celebrities. Then, Elvis was 32 and weighed 163 pounds. His only known medical ailment was slightly high blood pressure, presumably due to his high-fat diet.

Also in 1967, Elvis’s health took a sudden turn with progressive pain, insomnia, hypertension, lethargy, irrational behavior and immense weight gain. Over his remaining years, Elvis was seen by a number of different doctors and was hospitalized a number of times, all the while resorting to self-medication with a wide assortment of drugs from dozens of sources.

Doctor Nick, as Nichopoulos was called, stayed as Elvis’s personal physician till the end. He was present at the death scene as well as during the autopsy. Doctor Nick concurred with the coroner’s immediate conclusion that the cause of death was a natural cardiac event resulting from an arrhythmia, or sudden interruption of heartbeat, and agreed that Elvis’s death was not due to a drug overdose.

When the toxicology report was released, it came with a qualifier:

Because the tox report appeared to contradict the autopsy report’s stated cardiac cause of death, a prominent toxicologist was asked to review the findings. His opinion was:

“Coupled with this toxicological data are the pathological findings and the reported history that the deceased had been mobile and functional within 8 hours prior to death. Together, all this information points to a conclusion that, whatever tolerance the deceased may have acquired to the many drugs found in his system, the strong probability is that these drugs were the major contribution to his demise.”

The Tennessee Board of Health then investigated Elvis’s death which resulted in proceedings against Doctor Nick.

Evidence showed that during the seven and a half months preceding Elvis’s death—from January 1, 1977, to August 16, 1977—Doctor Nick wrote prescriptions for Elvis for at least 8,805 pills, tablets, vials, and injectables. Going back to January 1975, the count was 19,012.

These numbers might defy belief, but they came from an experienced team of investigators who visited 153 pharmacies and spent 1,090 hours going through 6,570,175 prescriptions and then, with the aid of two secretaries, spent another 1,120 hours organizing the evidence.

The drugs included uppers, downers and powerful painkillers such as Dilaudid, Quaalude, Percodan, Demerol, and Cocaine Hydrochloride in quantities more appropriate for those terminally ill with cancer.

Doctor Nick admitted to this. His defense was because Elvis was so wired on pain killers, he prescribed these medications to keep Elvis away from dangerous street drugs, thereby controlling Elvis’s addiction—addiction being a disease.

One of the defense witnesses was Dr. Forest Torrent, a prominent California physician and a pioneer in the use of opiates in pain treatment who explained how the effects this level of codeine would have contributed to Elvis’s death.

Central to misconduct allegations was the issue of high codeine levels in Elvis at the time of death—codeine being the prime toxicological suspect as the pharmaceutical contributor. It was established that Elvis obtained codeine pills from a dentist the day before his death and Doctor Nick had no knowledge of it.

The jury bought it, and Doctor Nick was absolved of negligence in directly causing Elvis Presley’s fatal event.

Continuing Investigation

Dr. Torrent was convinced there were other contributing factors leading to Elvis’s death. In preparation for Doctor Nick’s trial, Dr. Torrent had access to all of Elvis Presley’s medical records, including the autopsy and toxicology reports. Incidentally, these two reports are the property of the Presley estate and are sealed from public view until 2027, fifty years after Elvis’s death.

Dr. Torrent was intrigued by the sudden change in Elvis starting in 1967. He discovered that while in Los Angeles filming the movie Clambake, Elvis tripped over an electrical cord, fell, and cracked his head on the edge of a porcelain bathtub. Elvis was knocked unconscious and had to be hospitalized. Dr. Torrent found three other incidents where Elvis suffered head blows, and he suspected Elvis suffered from what’s now known as Traumatic Brain Injury—TBI—and that’s what caused progressive ailments leading to his death.

Dr. Torrent released a paper titled Elvis Presley: Head Trauma, Autoimmunity, Pain, and Early Death. It’s a fascinating read—recently published in the credible medical journal Practical Pain Management.

Dr. Torrent builds a theory that Elvis’s bathtub head injury was so severe it jarred brain tissue loose which leaked into his overall blood circulation. Later additional head injuries exacerbated the problem. This is now known to be a leading cause of autoimmune disorder which causes a breakdown of other organs. This progression was unknown in 1967 and Elvis went untreated. Side effects of TBIs include chronic pain, irrational behavior, and severe bodily changes such as obesity and enlarged organs like hearts and bowels.

Today, TBI is a recognized health issue in professional contact sports as well as incidental to motor vehicle accidents and workplace falls or other head injury events.

Dr. Torrent’s hypothesis holds that with a change in mental state and suffering chronic pain, Elvis Presley entered a ten year spiral towards death. He became hopelessly addicted to pain killers, practiced a terribly unhealthy diet and lethargic lifestyle, and resorted to the typical addict’s habit of sneaking a fix wherever he could. This led to early coronary vascular disease and, combined with his escalating weight and pill consumption, Elvis was a heart attack ready to burst.

Recall that I used the term antecedent, like all coroners do when assessing a cause of death. Given Dr. Torrent’s observations—and all the facts compiled from forty years—if I were the coroner completing Elvis Presley’s death certificate today, I’d write it like this:

  1. Identity of Deceased — Elvis Aaron Presley.

  2. Time of Death — Approximately 2:00 p.m. on Tuesday, August 16th, 1977.

  3. Place of Death — 3754 Elvis Presley Boulevard, Memphis, Tennessee.

  4. Cause of Death — Cardiac arrhythmia/myocardial infarction, antecedent to hypertensive cardiovascular disease with atherosclerotic heart disease, antecedent to poly-pharmacy, antecedent to autoimmune inflammatory disorder, antecedent to traumatic brain injury/injuries.

  5. Means of Death — Cumulative head trauma.

Therefore, I’d have to classify Elvis’s death as an accident.

There’s no one to blame—certainly not Elvis. He was a severely injured and sick man. There’s no specific negligence on anyone’s part and definitely no cover-up or conspiracy of a criminal act.

If Dr. Forrest Torrent is right, there simply wasn’t a proper understanding back then to clearly determine what really killed the King of Rock ‘n Roll.

*   *   *

Here’s the link to Dr. Torrent’s article Elvis Presley: Head Trauma, Autoimmunity, Pain, and Early Death as published in Practical Pain Management.

https://www.practicalpainmanagement.com/sites/default/files/images/2013/06/19/1.jpg

Fun Stuff With Elvis & John Fogerty

UNCONVENTIONAL CRIME WRITING WITH L.A. SCREENWRITER & NOVELIST JENNIFER GRAESER DORNBUSH

…Or How to Capitalize On An Unconventional (aka Crazy) Childhood & Other Personal Adventures — Los Angeles based screenwriter, author and speaker, Jennifer Graeser Dornbush chats about her life as a coroner’s daughter, her new mystery novel The Coroner, her love of forensics, the realities of working in Hollywood and what common crime writers can do to capitalize on their own personal stories.

Hi Jen! Welcome to DyingWords! We’ve kicked around crime writing & screenplay ideas for a while now, but have something in common besides forensic and scribing stuff. You grew up in northern Michigan, close to me in southern Manitoba, Canada—both of us under very unusual circumstances. I won’t shudder you with mine, but tell us about yours.

Long before American television was saturated with CSI and Forensic Files, I was living my own weekly CSI adventure with my family in northern Michigan. My father was a medical examiner for three counties and my mother assisted as his office manager. They ran the office out of our home because the county was underfunded.

Dad performed autopsies at the small county hospital morgue, but all the records, paperwork, and photographs were kept in our family office. Samples of blood and body tissue were stored in a basement freezer, right under the pork chops and frozen beans like some B-rated horror flick. Dinnertime conversations often revolved around the case of the week. “Let me tell you about an interesting suicide I saw today,” my dad would say. “Oh, and pass the corn, please.”

When I started writing I began to tap into my past and the treasure trove of knowledge from those decades of death investigation with my family. My new novel, The Coroner is one result of that.

The title “Coroner” is sorta familiar to me… like deja vu all over again. What’s your new novel The Coroner about?

Recently engaged and deeply ensconced in her third year of surgical residency in Chicago, Emily Hartford gets a shock when she’s called home to Freeport, MI, the small town she fled a decade ago after the death of her mother. Her estranged father, the local medical examiner, has had a massive heart attack and Emily is needed urgently to help with his recovery.

Not sure what to expect, Emily races home, blowing the only stoplight at the center of town and getting pulled over by her former high school love, now Sheriff, Nick Larson. At the hospital, she finds her father in near total denial of the seriousness of his condition. He insists that the best thing Emily can do to help him is to take on the autopsy of a Senator’s teen daughter whose sudden, unexplained death has just rocked the sleepy town.

Reluctantly agreeing to help her father and Nick, Emily gets down to work, only to discover that the girl was murdered. The autopsy reminds her of her many hours in the morgue with her father when she was a young teen―a time which inspired her love of medicine. Before she knows it, she’s pulled deeper into the case and closer to her father and to Nick―much to the dismay of her big city fiance. When a threat is made to Emily herself, she must race to catch the killer before he strikes again in The Coroner, expertly written and sharply plotted, perfect for fans of Patricia Cornwell and Julia Spencer Fleming.

You have a set of guidelines you use when drafting stories about real people or events. What does that look like?

There are many more from the hundreds of stories in my memory bank. But when writing about the past, I try to keep the following things in mind:

* Base characters off of real people but give them different names, personality traits, and visual description.

In The Coroner, Dr. Emily Hartford was based off of conglomeration of myself, and my two younger sisters. Emily is little bits of all of us. My middle sister is more blood and guts oriented like Emily. My younger sister has the tenacity, style, and individuality of Emily. And I have lived in major cities, including Chicago, for most of my life, but always find myself returning home to my rural roots.

* Use real places to help with world building.

For instance, the town of Freeport is based on my hometown of Fremont. I know, not a far cry from its original name. But that actually helped me picture the real place when I wrote. Of course, I kept the place of Chicago and I think that helps ground the story some and gives it an element of reality. When I write I picture different places around “Freeport.” The library, the downtown, the lakes, countryside, hospital. This helps me create authentic descriptions. I also have a deep, deep love for the place where I grew up. I think that love shows through in the tone and in how Emily, Nick, and her father view Freeport. I really want Freeport to be a character unto its own.

* Tap into the unpleasant memories.

Some of the memories I have of being a coroner’s daughter are neutral, some comedic, some embarrassing, and some downright unpleasant or scary. For instance, we had a human leg in our barn for years and I was scared to into the barn alone with that leg. This was really bummer (not to mention a bit smelly) because our childhood fort was situated right above it in the barn loft. I would fling the barn door open, flip on the light, and then run past the leg and scramble up the ladder to get to my loft fort where I could spend hours reading and holding tea parties. 

So rewrite your scary childhood memories in a way that takes power away from the scary and unsavory. Keep the emotion and be true to the experience. Writing it removes the negative power it holds in your memory. Sharing makes it seem less scary.

* Feel the fear and use it!

We all have those tangible fears like fear of heights, snakes, or tornados. But what are your biggest psychological fears? Figure it out and tap it that for your characters. One of mine is fear of missing out. I think Emily carries that same fear because of the trauma she experienced when she was left out of her mother’s death investigation. This drives everything she’s done in her life since. She’s gone full out to experience life at its fullest. Even in her romantic relationship with Brandon. He leads her into a world she would have never experienced back in Michigan.

* Embrace the crazy.

Everyone’s childhood is unique and special. Once you can frame it this way in your mind, it becomes less embarrassing. Try to see your experiences as a view into a world that no one has ever experienced before and is dying (no pun intended) to know about. I spent many years been deeply embarrassed and disgusted by what my father did for a living. I thought it was weird and gross. This was pre-Forensic Files era when no one knew anything about forensic science and Abby Scuito wasn’t making it cool on NCIS. Where was Abby when I was a teen!? We woulda been Insta-besties. I know it. After all, dead bodies sometimes slept in my garage.

* Leave the family skeletons in the closet.

We literally had a family skeleton. His name was Sam and he was a made of real human bones. He spent a good deal of time in my father’s medical practice, but in his later years ended up living in a box in our barn. Sam died of lung cancer. Or so we surmised by evidence of a cigarette dangling from his yellowed teeth bones. Sam has since gone on to enjoy the rest of his boney life in a high school biology lab.I suspect I’ll get disagreement here, but I’m not a big fan of using fiction to launch a passive aggressive attack on family, air dirty laundry, or take revenge on a family member by making them an unsavory antagonist.

Show some human decency and respect the privacy of yourself and your real life family. There’s enough other drama and dysfunction out there to go around.  So, just to be clear, none of the things that happened to the Hartford family ever happened to my own mom and dad. Their circumstances, backstories, and demises are purely, 100 percent fictional!

* If it made you cringe, use it!

Those embarrassing moments and experiences of our childhood are universal. Draw from these because they will help your audience become endeared to your characters.I’ve had my share of embarrassing moments as a coroner’s daughter. I’ll never forget the time I was dating my now husband and his friends came over. They were in the basement hanging out when they decided to look in the fridge for some soda. Instead, they found blood vials labeled with the names and DODs of the deceased. This was simply the property of the medical examiner’s office, nothing sinister.

This particular incident didn’t make it into the current novel, but one can imagine how awkward or odd it might have been for Emily, as a young teen, to have a dating life. It didn’t scare Nick away. And thankfully, not my husband either. Honor the real victims. In The Coroner, Julie Dobson’s murder is based off a girl in my hometown who was thrown from her horse, hit her head, and as a result, died. She and I were both in junior high school when this happened.

There was nothing sinister about girl’s death. It was purely accidental, but the tragedy of this young girl’s early demise deeply affected my community. I wanted to memorialize this young victim. She may have died long ago, but she’s not forgotten. When I was trying to come up with a case for Emily to investigate, I started playing the “what if” game. What if a teen equestrian were suddenly found dead? What if it were a murder? Who would want her dead and why? And the rest is between the jacket cover.

What inspired you to first start writing?

I’ve been writing since before I could actually write, so I guess you could say it was a gift that was given to me rather than something that inspired me. I’m grateful every day for this gift and my prayer is that I will continue to be a good steward of it.

What piece of advice do you have for authors or screenwriters starting out?

Have patience. Have perseverance. Have a real life.

Well put. Now, what was your favorite book when you were a kid? Do you have a favorite book now?

I have so many… I can’t choose just one. My tastes vary a lot. As a kid, my parents led me to the shore of story sea. I waded in and never got out.

Do you ever get writer’s block? If so, what do you do to get back on track?

I guess that depends on what is the definition of Writer’s Block? Do I have those days when I feel stuck and muddy and don’t get much done? Of course. That’s part of the job. Do I even not know what to write about? Never. I think the best tool for a writer is to cultivate the skills of listening and looking around. If you do, you’ll find there’s always fodder for story.

You’ve consulted with writers on various TV series like… Suits, Prison Break, Rectify, White Collar and Bull. Can you tell us about those experiences?

It probably sounds more exciting than it really is. Often times writers on shows will contact me for forensic advice. Some of the writers I know personally. Others, I do not. Mostly I serve them via email correspondence so I’m not on set or in the writers’ room, per se. But they do send me really interesting questions like…

If a body was burned to ash, how much tissue/bone/teeth/other substance do we need to DNA match the remains?

Or this one… a man who already takes smart drugs (like Adderall or Ritalin) is poisoned by someone who secretly put heavy doses of his smart drug in his hand sanitizer. When the man uses the hand sanitizer he absorbs the smart drug through his skin and it’s enough (in addition to the smart drug he already took orally) to cause a heart attack. Would this work?

You started writing in Hollywood before you delved into novels. Or, I think you once corrected that “Hollywood” is actually called the Los Angles film industry business. What’s that like, being around “Hollywood” and all?

That’s right… after several other careers in journalism and teaching, I trained to be a screenwriter and moved to “Hollywood” 12 years ago. I write film and TV. I had a film release in September (God Bless the Broken Road). But my love is TV. I’m hoping to get staffed or sell my own show. My goal for 2019 is to be a working TV writer and use my forensic background on crime dramas.

You also wrote the non-fiction book Forensic Speak? How did that come about?

FS started out as a project for an independent study course I designed in order to earn my certificate at the Forensic Science Academy. To pass the academy, I needed a prerequisite course and when that course was canceled after the first week of class, I convinced the director of the program to allow me to write a handbook for crime writers instead. I was the only writer in the class and I wanted to tailor something specific to my educational goals. The director loved the idea, so off I went. Later, my writing group encouraged me to publish it. But I was so busy at the time that I dismissed it.

What was your process for writing Forensic Speak and getting it published?

After I finished the academy a writer friend sent me a YouTube video to Michael Wiese Publishing. In the video, Ken Lee announced that MWP was seeking material. My friend encouraged me to send in a query. The book was far from ready, but I thought, why not? On a lunch break one day, I wrote a query and sent it off. In less than an hour later, Ken contacted me to say MWP was interested. However… it took us a year from to get the pitch right and figure out what the book would be. So I didn’t actually sign the book contract until a year after I sent the query. From there it took me another year to write the book. This month will mark exactly three years since I entered the Forensic Science Academy and had the idea to write the book.

Having such an intense upbringing around forensic science, how did you decide what to include and what to discard?

My upbringing dealt primarily with death investigation, not so much criminology, DNA, ballistics, and fingerprinting. I wanted to round out my knowledge of crime investigation so I attended the Forensic Science Academy here in Los Angeles. When I was telling my writer friends about my experiences in the academy, they said that they wished they could go through it. I thought, well, why not put the academy in book form for those who aren’t able to take the academy?  That inspired me to create a book built on the forensic foundation we were taught in the academy. Forensic science is vast and growing! My book is a smorgasbord. You get a sample of everything. You can pick and choose what you need. And if you want more of one thing, I’ve provided resources that will bring you to a larger meal.

What are the three biggest mistakes new writers make when writing in the crime genre?

1. Not spending the time, energy, or research to get the forensic facts right.

2. Thinking that what they see on TV or in movies is correct procedure.

3. Writing crime scenes that come off at cliche, plastic, or static (in action and dialogue!).  Learn how to speak forensics! Read Forensic Speak!

Additional advice for crime writers?

  • Read and watch crime fiction.
  • Figure out what brand of crime fiction best suits you.
  • Keep a journal or file of interesting cases you want to explore in your writing.
  • Create interesting, dynamic antagonists. Give them a story, a life, an emotional motivation.

Advice for non-fiction writers?

Write about your hobbies and interests to benefits others. Find your niche and explore 10 ways you can share what you know with others.

For example… I took the concept behind Forensic Speak and created a monthly newsletter that features a forensic fun fact, a forensic link of the month, a forensic term of the month and a crime writer’s Q&A of the month. Then, I created a series of seminars… Writing the Killer Procedural, 10 Essential Steps in Death Investigation, How to Choose a Crime Show That’s Write For You…  You get the picture… be creative and do what inspires you.

What do you know now that you wish you knew when you first started writing?

How long things take!!! I wish I had started out with more patience. I still get impatient and anxious at times. I want things to happen sooner, faster, better!

Not to be so hard on myself, but I guess that’s human nature and my stubborn work ethic. It’s okay to push. But you also have to play. Trust in the process and the journey.

Focus on Being Thankful! Have daily gratefulness and keep a gratitude journal. Keeps you sane. You can see how much you really have. Reminds you how far you’ve been. Thank goodness for coffee, yoga, and my wiener dogs.

Could you give a sneak peek into your next projects?

I’m always spinning many plates… here are a few of the dishes I’m working on…

A mystery/thriller novel called Hole in the Woods based on true crime story that I’ve followed for 25 years. We have several publishers waiting to see it. Fingers crossed!

I’ve just finished a crime drama TV pilot called Prey based on the real-life experiences of a group of nuns who pose as prostitutes to save sex trafficked victims. Now we have to go pitch it and try to sell it!

This fall, I’ve been pitching my novel, The Coroner, as a TV series. We have some solid interest so it will be interesting to see what unfolds in 2019 with that project. The second Coroner novel is also completed and releases in fall, 2019.

Which novel/novella/short story have you read that you would like to see made into a movie? 

The short story, Before Gwen by Dennis Lehane. A very good friend of mine who is a female director introduced this story to me. She wants us to partner on it. It’s stunning and haunting. I’m all in.

Thanks so much for sharing your experience, expertise and encouragement to crime novelists and screenwriters, Jen. Leaving off, where can DyingWords readers find you and your work?

Go directly to my website. You can sign up for my newsletter here and it’s a great place to find my books, more forensic resources, other free crime stuff and connect on social media!

*   *   *

The television or movie screen is the closest most people will ever come to witnessing the forensic world. But Jennifer Dornbush actually lived it. As a daughter of a medical examiner, whose office was in her home, she investigated her first fatality, an airplane crash, when she was 8 years old. Since that first case she has had decades of on-sight experience in death investigation and 360 hours of forensic training through the Forensic Science Academy.

Jennifer now uses these experiences to pen crime fiction for film, TV, and novel. Currently, Jennifer has several crime drama series being developed for television; her mystery novel series, The Coroner, releases in 2018.

Wanting to share her love of forensics with other storytellers, she scribed non-fiction work, Forensic Speak: How To Write Realistic Crime Dramas, published by Michael Wiese Productions, hailed as a north star to creating authentic crime dramas.

 She teaches seminars and speaks on writing crime fiction for screen and novel, surviving and thriving the artist’s life, the novelization process of scripts, crime scene science, forensic fundamentals, and death investigation. A more complete list of seminars is found on www.jenniferdornbush.com.

She is frequently asked to consult with writers and has consulted on shows such as *Beauty & The Beast   *Deception   *Hawaii Five-O   *Leverage   *Prison Break   *Rectify  *Revolution   *Suits   *White Collar   *Conviction

Jennifer hosts a YouTube channel on forensics and crime writing. She has also taught webinars on crime writing through Writer’s Digest; and collaborated with The Writers Store and Script Magazine to produce a video on crime writing for writers. She has taught screenwriting on the high school and university level and mentored writers through the Act One Program, Regent University, and Universita Catholica Milano.

Some of her past speaking clients include The Writers Store, Great American Pitchfest, Crime Writers Weekend, Sisters in Crime, Greenhouse, Act One, Scriptwriters Network, Romance Writers of America, Mystery Writers of America, Story Expo, American Christian Fiction Writers, Highbridge Film Festival, and Universita Cattolica Milano, Italy; Write Canada, and the Pacific Northwest Writers Group.

Additionally. Jennifer’s scripts have placed her on the shortlists of the Fox/Blacklist TV Program, Final Draft Big Break, Nichols, Austin, American Zoetrope, and NBC’s Writers on the Verge. Her half-hour forensic comedy, Home Bodies, received a Humanitas’ New Voices Award. Her feature film, God Bless the Broken Road, with God’s Not Dead director, Harold Cronk released in 2018. She also penned the novel adaptation for Howard Books/Simon & Schuster.

As an award-winning film scribe, TV writer, and novelist, Jennifer delivers story tools that will help you create high stakes, entertaining crime dramas while incorporating current and authentic forensic methods. She has a distinct knowledge of 14 different forensic disciplines and has served as a forensic consultant for TV and film.  She regularly leads seminars on crime writing and forensics for writers in the U.S. and abroad. For more information or to book a speaking engagement, with Jennifer please visit www.jenniferdornbush.com.

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