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Authors: Stephen Booth
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probably wish him a Merry Christmas.’
When he heard the laughter, the anthropologist looked up from the excavation with a suspicious scowl. He had a pale, bald head, almost the same colour as the paper scene suit he was wearing. Water gleamed on his scalp. From rain or sweat, it was impossible to tell.
‘How is it going, Doctor?’ called Hitchens.
‘Mixed fortunes, I’m afraid. A dry soil would have preserved the body better. But this is, well …’ He scooped a handful of mud that seeped through his fingers.
‘Too wet?’
‘Correct. Much too wet.’
‘But there’s some good news, I take it?’
‘Well, you know, there are plenty of opportunities on an isolated farm for disposing of a body. If your aim is to reduce the remains to something unidentifiable, then burial is actually one of the slowest and least successful ways to achieve that.’
‘It’s much quicker just to leave it exposed somewhere, if you can get away with it,’ suggested Cooper.
‘Yes. How do you know that?’
‘Every livestock farmer knows that a dead sheep left out in the open during the summer will be reduced to a skeleton within a month.’
‘Exactly. Burying a corpse just slows the process of decomposition. A deeply buried body can take eight times as long to decompose as one exposed on the surface. In this case, burial and the use of plastic sheeting are the two factors which might enable the victim to be identified.’
Protective clothing was being distributed to the forensics team – coveralls, hair caps, gloves and shoe protectors. Trace evidence was transferred so easily that it could be carried away from a crime scene just as easily as it was carried there.
Next to the grave an area had been provided for the scientists to work in, preventing any more disturbance of the grave itself than was necessary. Soil would be removed by lifting it in layers of about ten inches at a time, then it would be passed through sieves of various mesh sizes to extract evidence. They would be trying to locate fragments of bone, personal items, anything that had been dropped or didn’t belong in the area. Some of the anthropology students had begun cursing when they saw the condition of the soil they were supposed to sieve.
‘Yes, buried bodies can be said to be protected from the elements to a large extent. If the soil is acidic, the body will tend to decompose more rapidly. In temperate zones, or areas with severe winters, the processes of decomposition are slowed. Did you know that fat people skeletalize much faster? It’s because their flesh feeds huge armies of maggots. It’s not a weight-loss programme I’d recommend, but maggots can strip forty pounds of surplus flesh off an obese body in twenty-four hours.’
The remains would have to be exposed completely before they could be lifted from the grave. There was too much risk of losing body parts to the sucking grasp of the wet clay. The excavation team had come equipped with an array of small tools – dental picks, bamboo sticks, paint brushes and hand trowels. Fry could see that this was going to be a long, slow, painstaking job. And even after the remains had been removed, the excavation would continue. The anthropologist had called for a further ten inches of soil to be taken from below the body, in case small bones or other evidence had been left behind.
The whole process was being recorded by video and digital photography, as well as handwritten records at every stage. Items that were discovered with the body which might indicate an identity couldn’t be assumed to belong to the victim. Intentional placing of false documents had been known. Anything to confuse investigators.
Fry leaned forward to get a view of the remains, her shoes slipping on the edge of the duckboard.
‘Some parts of the body look very grey, Doctor.’
‘Saponification. It’s a factor that can affect a body after burial, especially if it’s buried in a moist area or directly exposed to water
When he heard the laughter, the anthropologist looked up from the excavation with a suspicious scowl. He had a pale, bald head, almost the same colour as the paper scene suit he was wearing. Water gleamed on his scalp. From rain or sweat, it was impossible to tell.
‘How is it going, Doctor?’ called Hitchens.
‘Mixed fortunes, I’m afraid. A dry soil would have preserved the body better. But this is, well …’ He scooped a handful of mud that seeped through his fingers.
‘Too wet?’
‘Correct. Much too wet.’
‘But there’s some good news, I take it?’
‘Well, you know, there are plenty of opportunities on an isolated farm for disposing of a body. If your aim is to reduce the remains to something unidentifiable, then burial is actually one of the slowest and least successful ways to achieve that.’
‘It’s much quicker just to leave it exposed somewhere, if you can get away with it,’ suggested Cooper.
‘Yes. How do you know that?’
‘Every livestock farmer knows that a dead sheep left out in the open during the summer will be reduced to a skeleton within a month.’
‘Exactly. Burying a corpse just slows the process of decomposition. A deeply buried body can take eight times as long to decompose as one exposed on the surface. In this case, burial and the use of plastic sheeting are the two factors which might enable the victim to be identified.’
Protective clothing was being distributed to the forensics team – coveralls, hair caps, gloves and shoe protectors. Trace evidence was transferred so easily that it could be carried away from a crime scene just as easily as it was carried there.
Next to the grave an area had been provided for the scientists to work in, preventing any more disturbance of the grave itself than was necessary. Soil would be removed by lifting it in layers of about ten inches at a time, then it would be passed through sieves of various mesh sizes to extract evidence. They would be trying to locate fragments of bone, personal items, anything that had been dropped or didn’t belong in the area. Some of the anthropology students had begun cursing when they saw the condition of the soil they were supposed to sieve.
‘Yes, buried bodies can be said to be protected from the elements to a large extent. If the soil is acidic, the body will tend to decompose more rapidly. In temperate zones, or areas with severe winters, the processes of decomposition are slowed. Did you know that fat people skeletalize much faster? It’s because their flesh feeds huge armies of maggots. It’s not a weight-loss programme I’d recommend, but maggots can strip forty pounds of surplus flesh off an obese body in twenty-four hours.’
The remains would have to be exposed completely before they could be lifted from the grave. There was too much risk of losing body parts to the sucking grasp of the wet clay. The excavation team had come equipped with an array of small tools – dental picks, bamboo sticks, paint brushes and hand trowels. Fry could see that this was going to be a long, slow, painstaking job. And even after the remains had been removed, the excavation would continue. The anthropologist had called for a further ten inches of soil to be taken from below the body, in case small bones or other evidence had been left behind.
The whole process was being recorded by video and digital photography, as well as handwritten records at every stage. Items that were discovered with the body which might indicate an identity couldn’t be assumed to belong to the victim. Intentional placing of false documents had been known. Anything to confuse investigators.
Fry leaned forward to get a view of the remains, her shoes slipping on the edge of the duckboard.
‘Some parts of the body look very grey, Doctor.’
‘Saponification. It’s a factor that can affect a body after burial, especially if it’s buried in a moist area or directly exposed to water
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