Faces Of Death Page #3

OK.

Here, here.

Where's the ambulance?

A man hired to defend the alligator lost his

life to the creature he was trying to protect.

This time, when given the chance,

the alligator became the hunter.

John Wilkes Booth.

James Earl Ray.

Lee Harvey Oswald.

Sirhan Sirhan.

La Salle, France. 1968.

There was another member that

I neglected to add to the list of assassins.

Franois Jordan.

One of the unique characteristics of man

is that he is the only animal on earth

that kills for greed.

I had the unusual experience

of meeting the individual responsible

for the assassination

you have just witnessed.

His weapons are the tools of his trade,

while his aim brings him his wealth.

My name is Franois Jordan.

I'm a hired assassin.

When I kill,

it is for business,

not for political,

nor even social value.

But there is

another kind of killer -

the human being

who murders for no apparent reason.

This person

is placed in a situation

where violence

is the only means of dealing with reality.

There are no judgments or morals

behind the crime.

It is an eruption of repression

that manifests itself

by causing the deaths of others.

On July 10, 1973,

Mike Lawrence went berserk.

This remarkable footage is a classic

example of a man's mind that snapped.

We've trapped him up in the house.

I want you guys to go under.

You try and throw the tear gas

along there, OK?

- Come on out.

- Make it easy on yourself.

- No. I'll kill you!

- Come on out with your hands up.

After several hours, Lawrence's

one-man revolt was finally defeated.

But Lawrence was not the only victim

that died on that summer afternoon.

Get outta here.

Come on, move out!

What caused this man

to murder his family?

Is our society to blame?

Perhaps there is a Mike Lawrence

in each of us,

ready to explode

when the time is right.

The primary responsibility of

the county coroner of Los Angeles County

is to investigate and inquire

the circumstances surrounding deaths

of a sudden and unexpected nature,

or by homicide,

by suicide, by accident

or presumed natural causes,

but a diagnosis has not been determined.

This responsibility

is clearly written

by state statute.

The Los Angeles County

coroner's office.

open, for death has no time schedule.

The law states that

when a person is suspected of dying

by other than natural means,

or if death occurs

without medical attendance for 20 days,

the coroner's office must investigate.

Coroner investigators in the field

handle as many as 40 cases per day.

Once their initial inquiry into

the victim's death has been completed,

they accompany the body

to the morgue.

After registering weight, height

and fingerprinting,

exploratory x-rays are conducted.

This homicide victim

had been involved in a gang war.

In this particular case,

after a total x-ray scan,

the bullet that caused death

was located.

The cadaver is then placed

in the hands of forensic pathologists.

These men are medical doctors

who conduct autopsies

determining criminal responsibility

in a death.

As I walked around, I was reminded of

words written by the late Luther Easton.

"In a world with no sound,

their cries go unheard.

"The reality of life

becomes totally absurd.

"The counting of time

is considered a crime.

"And the money one earns,

not worth a lone dime.

"So here they will lie

for the rest of the night.

"Their bodies remain still

in darkness and in light.

"But don't be afraid

for it will happen to you.

"When all will stop

as your body turns blue."

I'm not really sure

why these words came to me.

Perhaps it was from

my feelings of sadness.

I had witnessed many young people

in the prime of their lives

the victims of sudden death.

Obviously it was their time to die,

but was this their destiny?

Had their fate been preplanned?

Did any of these people ever know

they would die by violent means?

Now it was too late.

By the time they would leave this morgue,

the mystery of their death

would have hopefully been solved.

Not all death can be identified

through autopsies.

If the forensic pathologist is still unsure

of the cause, technology intervenes.

Specimens of tissue

are prepared for microscopic study.

What may be missed by the eye will be

discovered by intense magnification.

Aided by an electron scanning microscope,

computers can analyze human tissue

and identify the source of a weapon

used in a crime.

The embalming process is another area

that cannot go unnoticed.

By injecting the body with fluid,

the pathologist is given the gift of time.

Because the workload is so immense,

some victims may have to wait weeks

before their case is solved.

With a preservatory fluid injected,

the cadaver is then refrigerated in

an environment of 42 degrees Fahrenheit.

Having witnessed

the entire process of this institution,

I began to wonder about the people

who comprised the staff.

Being a pathologist,

I am used to the autopsy routine.

But in my work, the patient dies

of natural causes or a specific disease.

The role of a doctor in

the coroner's environment differs greatly.

He is witness

to the atrocities mankind creates.

Intrigued by this kind of pressure, I asked

Dr. Noguchi how he views his own death.

He replied that, for him,

life on this planet is a transitory stop

for the spirit moves on after death.

After thinking about

this man's answer,

I understood how he maintained

his own sense of balance.

A few days after my visit there, I questioned

whether I would suffer a violent death.

Knowing full well that I had little control

over this decision,

it occurred to me how short life really is,

how little control we really have.

In 1974, Larry DeSilva brutally raped

and then murdered an 84-year-old woman.

After a lengthy trial, he was sentenced

to death by means of electrocution.

Because of the general outcry

against the inhumane method of hanging,

the electric chair was the next step

in the development of capital punishment.

Its premier was in New York

during the year 1890.

Larry DeSilva would soon join the list

of criminals that have died in this fashion.

It's time.

DeSilva told me he had read about

the method that would take his life.

When I asked him if he was afraid,

he looked at me and smiled.

But when the guards led him down

death row to the execution chamber,

DeSilva seemed nervous

and totally disoriented.

He finally told me

he was scared to die.

When I asked him if he ever thought about

this possibility as he murdered the woman,

he replied, "All I wanted was her goddamn

wallet and the b*tch gave me a hard time."

DeSilva's history in crime

was a lengthy one.

At 34, 17 of those years were spent

in and out of penal institutions.

Beginning with petty theft,

DeSilva finally committed a crime

which would cost him his life.

Good luck, Joe.

Goin' straight to hell right out, man.

Goin' straight to hell right out, man.

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