Identificación mediante estudio comparativo de radiografías craneales ante mórtem y post mórtem

Abstract

In this paper we are presenting a case in which the only available tool for setting out identification was matching two pairs of ante-mortem and post-mortem cranium radiographies.In collaboration with international Police Brigades, the body was taken to the Forensic Anthropology Unit of the Forensic Pathology Department of the Catalan Institute of Legal Medicine (IMLC) for morphological and radiological study.There were two ante-mortem radiographies: one of them in lateral projection and the other one in nose-chin projection. The frontal radiography presented an unusual projection (nose and chin), focused on the study of the maxillas sinuses which were full (sinusitis).In this case, post-mortem radiographies were performed. Several radiological projections of the skull: forehead and side, base (Hirtz projection), nose-chin plate (Waters projection) to visualize the frontal sinuses. In the comparative study of the frontal sinuses the methods used by Delclós in his anthropometric studies were also implemented. It was compared the ante-mortem and post-mortem radiographies images using a process of superposition of the images.Anyway, the lack of remarkable dissimilarities between the ante-mortem and post-mortem radiographies made the identification possible.