Working with the Medical Examiner & Wildlife Specialists

Human or animals remains?



This is a common question when body parts are found throughout the county.  The medical examiner determined this body part was not human and turned it over to our laboratory.  Our close working relationship over the past 40 years with the USDA wildlife specialists in our office made easy identification of this as the foot of a bear.  The claws are commonly clipped off for use in a necklace.





Bullets are removed for ballistic tests
We have a working arrangement with the Medical Examiner in cases where both people and animals are shot or killed. They autopsy the two legged ones, except for birds, we the four legged ones. We normally do ours first so they can have as much history and background information as possible before starting, and we often rely on their x-ray equipment to locate and help retrieve bullets.

A Margarita would be nice, but please leave out the strychnine.
One case we collaborated with the Medical Examiner on involved a very attractive cheerleader who was having an alleged affair with a football player while being married to another player. Her husband found this out and gave her a margarita rimmed with crystallized strychnine instead of salt. This caused intermittent convulsions and her to scream. The neighbors started pounding on their common wall. The husband then called 911, where the dispatcher could hear her scream "You've poisoned me." The medical examiner had no previous experience with strychnine, but was aware that it was commonly used in animal poisonings, and they consulted with us as to possible sources. While our cases involve diluted forms impregnated into grain, stained green or orange, and purchased locally as a rodent bait, their case involved pure white crystalline strychnine purchased in Tijuana. Yes the woman died, and the husband was convicted.






Not just a big pussy cat, this cougar killed a person.

Iris Kenna, a North Park woman was killed while hiking alone in Cuyamaca Rancho State Park. The Medical Examiner determined her wounds were typical of a cougar (mountain lion) attack. USDA wildlife specialists working out of our laboratory office found cougar signs at the location where the body was found. They used dogs to tree and take the lion. Dr. Johnstone, pictured here, necropsied (autopsied) the animal and recovered human parts identical to those missing from the person's body. DNA tests confirmed the parts matched the person. Such procedures are necessary to confirm that the correct lion was taken. In addition, Dr. Johnstone determined the lion was healthy, was not rabid, and had been feeding on deer.








Human & livestock protection trapping program.

Terry Cox USDA Wildlife Specialist
When this county was primarily a rural livestock raising area like most of California, coyotes were an economic problem for the livestock industry, killing sheep, calves and free ranging poultry. As a common practice in California, bounty was paid for the ears of coyotes. This resulted in indiscriminate killing of coyotes, not just the ones killing livestock, and not just the ones around livestock areas. Ears were also coming in from out of state, and from people poaching trap lines, i.e., stealing ears. As a better alternative, two federal wildlife specialists were employed in the county, one for the north and one for the south of the county. Trapping was targeted at the offending coyotes, only after confirmed livestock losses, and only until losses stopped. In 1966 there was a resurgence of wildlife rabies, mainly in foxes and bobcats. This led to a greatly expanded increase in the trapping program with 37 foxes, 9 bobcats, and 4 skunks laboratory confirmed as rabid in one year. This became the largest documented wildlife rabies outbreak in California history. With wildlife rabies, only one case in 10 is ever thought to be diagnosed. The outbreak was confined to the west by the ocean and to the east by the desert. The outbreak was moving north and was predicted to spread up the Coastal and Sierra Nevada mountain ranges to the rest of the state unless stopped. An extensive trapping program aimed at foxes and bobcats was conducted in a band across the northern part of the county. This was highly successful and stopped the outbreak from spreading north of Julian. The last case of this epidemic was a rabid fox caught in February of 1970. The outbreak resulted in one human death, that of a 2 yr. old boy bitten severely by a bobcat while playing in the back yard of his father's chicken ranch. Our common boundary with Mexico, and the history of concurrent rabies occurring both in San  Diego and Tijuana make international rabies control efforts in our area especially important. Foxes and coyotes move unrestricted across this border. Stray dog crossings have been greatly reduced by the current border fence in the San Diego Metropolitan area. In the case of foxes, an area that supports two foxes one year will pretty much support two the following year. Yet with 6 pups there are 8 foxes in an area that will only support 2. Only 2 animals will survive regardless of trapping. Infighting for territory perpetuates rabies. Trapping reduces infighting and reduces the spread of rabies. One objection to the trapping was that creating a relative vacuum in population would draw in animals from surrounding non- rabies areas. Rather than being undesirable, it benefited the program since the objective was to confine the outbreak by keeping infected animals from expanding outward carrying the disease to new areas. Another objection was that only infected animals should be trapped and destroyed. Since the incubation period for infected animals is as long as 6 months, each trapped individual would have to be housed and cared for up to 6 months, an impossibly expensive task. To release them after the quarantine period would only add to an already over populated area which at the end of the year would still only support two animals. The Board of Supervisors required the County Veterinarian to examine all trapped animals for rabies. With the usual superb efficiency of the laboratory staff this was accomplished without adding personnel. Public health officials at the Center for Disease Control recommended the program be continued for 6 months after the last confirmed case to allow for the incubation period required for new cases to show up. Nevertheless, the Board of Supervisors cut off the program after 3 months of no new cases. Fortunately this was long enough. Although there was no opposition to having the two original wildlife specialists to control livestock deprivation, in the haste to end the rabies control program, all trapping was terminated. Many years later two wildlife specialists were reinstated for livestock protection.

The County Veterinarian provides the office space and euthanasia training required for the wildlife specialists.
 




Dr Mahoney demonstrating anatomy of an opossum to a class of USDA Wildlife Specialists as part of euthanasia training.


To prevent problem predators from becoming someone else's problem, trappers were required to euthanize trapped animals. No facilities were provided for this purpose in urban and semi-urban areas where shooting was prohibited. Euthanasia with barbiturates was the only satisfactory procedure. This required a veterinary prescription and a DEA (Drug Enforcement Agency) permit to acquire. The wildlife specialists were federal employees within a division of the U.S. Dept. of Agriculture.  Even though the U.S. Dept. of Agriculture is the largest single employer of veterinarians in this country, none were willing to provide the required drug and training necessary. Rather than render the wildlife specialists in our county useless, the County Veterinarian provided the necessary training and drugs. The drugs were billed directly to the Department of Wildlife Services in Sacramento, and the training was provided without charge. This same arrangement was extended to the trapping program statewide to the great appreciation of the agency. More recently euthanasia drugs became available that did not require DEA prescriptions, and this part of the program was greatly simplified. Subsequent state laws stopped the use of leg-hold traps in most situations, rendering the wildlife specialists to mainly an advisory role, although euthanasia  is still required in some cases.




Bob Parker was one of many wildlife specialists that have worked with our office. Bob liked to get intimately involved with his work. Here he is performing a necropsy on a cougar caught after killing livestock and menacing hikers. He retired from the USDA and started his own business, "Animal Works", a wildlife capture and relocation service.







Coyote Kill, Another Example of Working with Wildlife Specialists











The right facts, the wrong conclusion:
The prosecutor had laid out all the facts of the case, which he said proved the defendant guilty. Abraham Lincoln as a young lawyer opened the defense with the following story: The young son of a farmer ran to his father and said "Sister and the hired man are in the hay mow. He has his pants down and she has her skirt up. I think they are both going to pee on the hay." The farmer replied "Son, you got all the facts right, but I think you reached the wrong conclusion." Such was the case of a wrong conclusion when the Point Loma area of San Diego was having a lot of cat bodies found. The citizens of the area thought there was some crazed cat hater killing cats, because these bodies were torn up, with organs missing, and looked like they had been cut apart. We necropsied a number of them and found bite marks, puncture wounds, and hemorrhage in the head and neck area, often across the back, or opposing fang marks on both sides of the chest. We reported them as a carnivore kill, most likely a coyote kill. The Point Loma people had another citizen's meeting and said they didn't believe our reports and had to get an outside expert to look into this. The veterinarians in the area didn't believe it either. Businessmen generally tell their clients what they want to hear. Finally the next carcass was sent to a central California private diagnostic laboratory, which for pathology is mostly a biopsy service. Their pathologist, while board certified in pathology, and an excellent general pathologist, was a recent graduate, who had never before worked outside a university laboratory, and had never before seen a carnivore kill. We received a copy of the report which contained a beautiful description of multiple puncture wounds on the external surfaces and across the head and other trauma that a pathologist in our laboratory would immediately conclude to be a carnivore kill. The report concluded the puncture wounds were due to B-Bs, even though none were found on radiographs and no exit wounds were found. Dr.Johnstone has worked with San Diego county wildlife specialists for more than forty years (since 1961) and Dr. Mahoney has had more than 25 years with these cases in our laboratory. In the last 40 years we have seen several hundred cases of animal deprivation. These cases were in all stages of trauma from a few pieces of chewed bone and hide remaining, up to and including animals actually observed being killed by dogs and coyotes. Nevertheless, the citizen's group and the veterinarians remained very adamant that these cases were due to some crazed cat hater, especially when they had their report from an outside expert. They used that one report as the bible and the only definitive report.




There are those who believe animal deprivation is due to "El Chupacabra"
In 1994 stories about a strange animal capable of sucking the blood out of livestock and domestic animals, mostly goats, started circulating in Puerto Rico, and eventually spread throughout Latin America, and to the Hispanic communities in the U.S. These traumatic deaths were attributed to an unknown predator referred to as "El Chupacabra" which is Spanish for goat sucker. This was due to the fact that no blood was noted at the site, and the animals were thought to have been drained of their blood. When such cases came to the attention of our laboratory, fresh carcasses were obtained for necropsy. All cases turned out to be typical carnivore kills. Carnivores simply lick up the blood of their prey. An international summit in Mexico City was held in 1998 where veterinary pathologists, wildlife investigators, and researchers concluded that there was no such creature known as "El Chupacabra". Still the myth is being perpetuated, and there are currently over 22,800 internet sites pertaining to "El Chupacabra". The above picture is from one of them.



Kimberley Williams, Laboratory assistant preparing beavers for necropsy in conjunction with the USDA Wildlife Services



Lawyer Stories
Like the staff of the County Medical Examiner's office our staff is also required to testify in court. There were occasions where a defense attorney tried to discredit our expertise:

Dr. Griner related one occasion where the conversation went as follows: Attorney: How many bones does a dog have? Dr. Griner: Well, is this any particular dog or breed? Attorney: No, just a hypothetical dog. Dr. Griner: Does this hypothetical dog have a long tail or a short one. Attorney: A long tail. Dr Griner: Well now, is this hypothetical dog a male or a female? Never mind the lawyer responded realizing that was nothing he wanted to pursue. I asked Dr. Griner "How many bones does a dog have?" He replied "I have no idea."

Dr. Johnstone was once asked by a defense attorney "Who paid for your testimony?" He replied "Why you did, the judge and the jury, and I guess everyone in this room who pays county taxes. I just get my regular salary. The attorney lost the case.

Dr. Guajardo was asked if he was board certified. He simply replied, "I don't need to be", and that was the end of that.

Dr Mahoney was once asked "Shall I call you Ms. or Mrs?" "You may call me Dr.", she replied.  The attorney  lost the case.





Our policy has been, in cases where there might be a trial, to take photographs and include a comment to that effect in our reports. That usually leads to a plea bargain rather than have a jury look at photos that can be rather graphic. At one of  Dr. Johnstone's cases that went to trial the defense attorney objected to showing the photos as being prejudicial and was only allowed to describe their contents. The pictures weren't that bad, and I am sure what the jury imagined was much worse, i.e., too horrible for them to see.