Death by Drowning - Murder, Suicide, Accident or Impossible to Tell?

The mechanism of death by drowning is complex.  Although drowning can be defined as 'suffocation owing to immersion of the nostrils and mouth in a liquid', a drowning person doesn't become asphyxiated simply by suffocation.

 

  
 

 

'Wet' Drowning

 

A conscious person immediately begins to struggle when he or she gets into difficulties in the water.  Every time the person comes to the surface they will try and take a breath and hold their breath when they become submerged again.  Inevitably, they will inhale some water and begin to cough vigorously.  Breathing becomes more difficult and snatched breaths become shorter and shorter.

 

Eventually exhaustion sets in; the person is unable to struggle any more and begins to drown.

 

The drowning person will no longer be able to hold their breath. They will inhale water until they lose consciousness and die.  Death may take 4 - 5 minutes in fresh water and 8 - 12 minutes in sea water.

 

'Dry' or 'Atypical' Drowning

 

People may also die as a result of sudden and unexpected immersion in cold water. 

 

This 'atypical' or 'dry'  drowning' is caused by cardiac arrest owing to 'vagal inhibition'.  This means that the vagal nerve, which lowers the heart rate in a healthy person, is, essentially, overstimulated so that the heart stops beating.  The person suffers almost immediate loss of consciousness and death follows soon afterwards. 

 

The Forensic Pathologist's Problem

 

Drowning cannot be proved by autopsy.  The pathologist has to take into account all the circumstances surrounding the death.  He or she has to prove that the victim was alive when they entered the water and exclude natural, traumatic and toxicological causes of death, before beginning to consider the possibility that the victim drowned. 

 

Here is a link to an article which explains in detail how a pathologist should investigate a possible drowning.

 

The Diagnostics of Drowning

 

So if establishing the fact of drowning is so difficult, can the pathologist determine whether the death was murder, suicide or simply an accident?

Accidental Drowning

The majority of drownings are accidental.  Alcohol intoxication is often a factor - falling into a swimming pool at a party or a solo midnight swim after a few drinks at a holiday beach bar, for example.

In non-alcohol-related accidental drownings, a small child may drown in a shallow garden pond while being left unsupervised or a dare-devil teenager may hit his head while jumping off rocks into the sea and doesn't re-surface alive.

In the absence of any other evidence to contradict a verdict of accidental death by drowning, the pathologist will be able to form his or her opinion accordingly.

Suicidal Drowning

Suicide by drowning is uncommon and difficult to prove without corroborative evidence, such as a suicide note (which must be verified as genuine by a forensic document examiner). 

It is also important to establish whether the victim had a significant history of mental illness.

If a person does decide to take their own life by drowning, the bathtub is the place of choice.  The victim may also have taken an overdose of medication or drunk a lot of alcohol beforehand.

Suicide victims in the bathtub are invariably clothed. 

The pathologist must establish that the nose and mouth of the victim were under water.  When the body is discovered by, for example, the victim's partner, he or she may empty the bathtub or move the body to get the airways clear of the water. 

Consequently, the pathologist cannot be absoutely certain of the original position of the body or the depth of water in the bathtub.

As with all potential findings of drowning, the pathologist must carefully correlate the circumstances preceding the death and the circumstances of the recovery of the victim from the water with the autopsy findings and laboratory analysis.  Only then can the pathologist form an opinion as to the likely case of death.

Homicidal Drowning

Homicidal drowning is actually very rare.  But with all victims that have apparently drowned, the pathologist must establish whether the person was dead or alive before they entered the water.

In other words, did somebody kill the victim first and then fake suicide or an accident or did the person hit their head or suffer a seizure, for example, before entering the water and drowning?

If the victim has injuries to the body, were they inflicted before or after drowning?  Was the cause of death the result of the injuries or the result of drowning?

It is not always possible for a pathologist to form a definite opinion about the cause of death in these instances.

Homicide may be suspected where an adult victim is found drowned in shallow water or when the victim is found naked in the bathtub in a staged 'suicide'.

If a healthy person is pushed into the water and drowns, there will be no evidence of homicide. 

An Unsolved Drowning Mystery:

This blog has barely scratched the surface of this complex topic, but I hope you will find something here to help you with your storylines.

I'm going to finish with a well-known, unsolved drowning mystery, which, perhaps highlights the difficulties that I have alluded to in my blog. 

Hollywood film star Natalie Wood drowned near Santa Catalina Island, California, in 1981.  She had been spending the weekend on a boat with her husband, Robert Wagner, and their friend, Christopher Walken.

At the time, her death was declared an accident by 'drowning and hypothermia'.

In November 2011, the case was re-opened, owing to 'new evidence' having been produced.  As a result of this new investigation, Natalie Wood's cause of death has been re-classified as 'drowning and undetermined factors'

Here is the boat's captain, Dennis Davern's version of events.

Just a cursory online search reveals numerous rumours and gossip surrounding Natalie Wood's death.  Maybe we will never know the truth.  However, the investigation remains open.