Study On Changes in Neck Structures in Cases of Death by Constriction of Neck by External Compression

Background: In this modern era even with advancement of technology and development of sophisticated weapons, death due to compression of neck by ligature is still in vogue. Death due to compression of neck constitutes a major portion of unnatural deaths in day-to-day medico legal practice. In such cases the manner of death is mostly suicidal or homicidal & very rarely accidental in nature. But in all cases cause of death is violent asphyxia irrespective of its manner. Aims & Objectives: To analyze the demographic characteristics of victims and detailed external and internal injury patterns in cases of death by constriction of neck by external compression Material & Method: Present study was conducted at Mortuary under Department of FMT of RGK Government Medical College of Kolkata, West Bengal over 100 cases of death due to external compression of neck, came for autopsy at the Morgue for one year period i. e. 01.04.2015 to 31.03.2016. Collected data were presented using SPSS for statistical analysis. Result: The study showed people from age group of (31 -40) years were the commonest among the victims. The incidence of suicidal compression 82 (82%) is more than homicidal compression 18 (18%) of the neck. Among the suicidal incidence most common method was adapted is hanging by ligature. Conclusion: The novelty of this study is not only to incorporate a wide array of variables starting from the age, sex, religion, occupation of the victims during profile analysis but also to look into the detail findings of internal and external neck injuries found in cases of suicidal hanging or strangulation by ligature that would may able to add further data as scientific evidence