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May

Abysmal Practices

Written by Satish Sekar

Worst Practice
The disgraced pathologist Michael Heath collected some maggots from the body of Russell Crookes where it was discovered in a wood, run by Hadlow Agricultural College, in May 1998. Crookes had been missing for almost a fortnight. Despite standard practice that Heath should have known, he didn't bother to sample extensively for maggots from different areas of the body or record the environmental conditions adequately, even though forensic entomology was obviously the best hope to establish a post-mortem-interval.

Heath made matters worse. Not only had he failed to sample the maggots extensively, as should have been done, but he failed to obtain the obvious data that was required to help calculate the post-mortem-interval. The point of sampling from different areas is that different species could be discovered and that would enable a more accurate post-mortem-interval to be calculated.

After ensuring that the maggots have been sampled correctly, fixed and live samples are handed over, environmental conditions, including the temperature in the maggot-mass, ambient temperature and under the body too must be established and recorded properly too. Then the maggots have to be reared to optimum standards in order to establish the various species, activity and hence the most accurate post-mortem-interval. None of that occurred in this inquiry.

Extensive Sampling?
Most maggots look the same to the untrained eye, but it is unlikely that only one species would colonise a body. This is crucial as identifying the different species allows a more accurate post-mortem-interval to be established, because different species have varied development patterns, which therefore allows the entomologist to establish the most likely range for the significant event to have occurred to the body.

Consequently, Heath's failure to sample the body adequately robbed the forensic entomologists of the best opportunity to establish the most accurate post-mortem-interval possible. Heath's dismal practices were to have dire consequences. He fixed some of the maggots in formalin, which was entirely proper at the time. Both the live samples and the fixed ones were handed over to the police. Heath probably told then to make sure that they were fed.

Police knowledge of what to do was rudimentary to put it mildly. The police placed a live sample in a dish with some liver, which probably caused them to drown in the juices produced from the liver in the fridge. The police failed to rear them adequately or even observe them. They were left to die in the fridge without even knowing when they died, which would have caused difficulties with the post-mortem-interval, although that need not have been important if the fixed samples were available, but they were not. Police threw those away without establishing any information that they could have given. That meant that the most accurate method to calculate the post-mortem-interval had been wasted.

Wasted Opportunities
The maggots remained hidden for five years. Best practice was to instruct a forensic entomologist to rear the live maggots, as that would help to identify the species. Heath must have known that, but it did not happen. Instead, they were allowed to die and were kept in the fridge for five years without even observing when they died, or making any attempt to establish the evidence that they could have given.

The maggots were completely wasted and Heath must bear some responsibility for that, but so must Sayers' defence pathologist. Peter Jerreat could have taken his own samples, or at the very least advised Sayers' solicitor, Ian Reed, to seek the expertise of a forensic entomologist. That didn't happen. Worse still if I had not known of forensic entomology, the maggots would never have had even the limited opportunity eventually provided to tell their story. That is scandalous.

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