Crime Quiz

Patricia Bradley Mystery Question 61 Comments

This weekend I spent time with friends and family at a family reunion. We ate and visited as we looked at old photos of those who had gone on.

Then because we had some who had not seen some of the old home places, we did a “tour” of Pocahontas, Tennessee, where most of the older folks had lived at one time or another. It was also a Civil War battlefield.

The photo is a view of one of the sites where a battle took place. Then we went on to two of the cemeteries and then got lost trying to find the third one. You know, of course, I was giving directions. 🙂

Now on to last week’s Mystery Question:

  1. The man’s death was an accident because the man who fired the shotgun didn’t know it was loaded.
  2. The man in the apartment who fired the shotgun was his father, who had a long standing habit of threatening his wife with the unloaded gun.
  3. The father knew his son intended to commit suicide and intentionally shot him on the way down and planned to claim it was an accident because the son’s $50,000 insurance policy didn’t pay in the event of suicide.
  4. The man’s death was ruled a suicide because even though there was a safety net that would have prevented his death, it couldn’t be homicide because the son had been the one who loaded the shotgun, hoping his mother would be killed during the next argument.

And the answer is…what most of you guessed:  #3. This was such an interesting story I thought I’d reprint it here:

At the 1994 annual awards dinner given for Forensic Science, AAFS President Dr. Don Harper Mills astounded his audience with the legal complications of a bizarre death.

On March 23, 1994, the medical examiner viewed the body of Ronald Opus and concluded that he died from a shotgun wound to the head. Mr. Opus had jumped from the top of a ten-story building intending to commit suicide. He left a note to the effect indicating his despondency. As he fell past the ninth floor his life was interrupted by a shotgun blast passing through a window, which killed him instantly. Neither the shooter nor the deceased was aware that a safety net had been installed just below the eighth floor level to protect some building workers and that Ronald Opus would not have been able to complete his suicide the way he had planned.

“Ordinarily,” Dr. Mills continued, “A person, who sets out to commit suicide and ultimately succeeds, even though the mechanism might not be what he intended, is still defined as committing suicide.” That Mr. Opus was shot on the way to certain death, but probably would not have been successful because of the safety net, caused the medical examiner to feel that he had a homicide on his hands.

The room on the ninth floor, where the shotgun blast emanated, was occupied by an elderly man and his wife. They were arguing vigorously and he was threatening her with a shotgun. The man was so upset that when he pulled the trigger he completely missed his wife and the pellets went through the window striking Mr. Opus. When one intends to kill subject “A” but kills subject “B” in the attempt, one is guilty of the murder of subject “B”.

When confronted with the murder charge the old man and his wife were both adamant and both said that they thought the shotgun was unloaded. The old man said it was a long-standing habit to threaten his wife with the unloaded shotgun. He had no intention to murder her. Therefore the killing of Mr. Opus appeared to be an accident; that is, if the gun had been accidentally loaded.

The continuing investigation turned up a witness who saw the old couple’s son loading the shotgun about six weeks prior to the fatal accident. It transpired that the old lady had cut off her son’s financial support and the son, knowing the propensity of his father to use the shotgun threateningly, loaded the gun with the expectation that his father would shoot his mother. Since the loader of the gun was aware of this, he was guilty of the murder even though he didn’t actually pull the trigger. The case now becomes one of murder on the part of the son for the death of Ronald Opus.

Now comes the exquisite twist.

Further investigation revealed that the son was, in fact, Ronald Opus. He had become increasingly despondent over the failure of his attempt to engineer his mother’s murder. This led him to jump off the ten-story building on March 23rd, only to be killed by a shotgun blast passing through the ninth story window. The son had actually murdered himself, so the medical examiner closed the case as a suicide.

Now for final twist…it turns out the story isn’t true. It is a hypothetical story that Dr. Harper Mills made up for the American Academy of Forensic Sciences. Somehow it made it to the internet and went viral. Kind of embarrassing for me…
And now you know “The Rest Of The Story…”
Now for this week’s Mystery Question, and I’ll see if I can find a true story this time lol: Three of the following crimes are true. I made up one. Can you guess which one I made up? Leave your answer and I’ll enter you in a drawing for Justice Betrayed at the end of the month.
  1. A suspected thief was foiled when the auto-lock of the car he broke into locked him inside, which was handy for the police when they arrived.
  2. A man taunted police that he was smarter than they were and they couldn’t catch him. Unfortunately, he videoed himself at his kitchen table where his utility bill with his address showing lay in plain sight.
  3. A thief used a stolen SIM cared to make a photo of himself inside a house he was burglarizing then posted it to the internet and accidentally to the victim’s work colleagues along with his location.
  4. A man used a bag to cover his head while he burglarized a hotel, but then he was caught on camera removing the bag, exposing his face for the world to see.
Okay, Super Sleuths, which one did I make up? Leave your answer in the comments. And I’m curious–do you enjoy family reunions?
[tweet_box design=”default” float=”none”]One of the crimes is false. Can you tell which one? Leave a comment and I’ll enter you in a drawing for a copy of Justice Betrayed by Patricia Bradley! #bookgiveaway[/tweet_box]

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Comments 61

  1. Priscilla Bettis

    Haha, I had to laugh a little about you all getting lost looking for the cemetery. Then I laughed harder about the viral forensic story.:-)

    I choose number 1 because I hope a car can’t lock anyone inside, scary!

    It can be exhausting traveling across the country to family reunions, but it’s always nice to see my fave aunt and uncle.

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  4. Delores E. Topliff

    PS Anytime I see pictures of or even hear of Civil War battle areas, I think “metal detector”. In rural southern Georgia I once dug an exploded lead bullet out of a tree and liked to think it was Civil War vintage. Not sure, but it’s all fascinating.

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  6. Mary Hart

    I’m going with #1, too. We have found our car locked, when we didn’t leave it locked (in the garage). Good thing that we didn’t leave the keys in it!

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  7. Ellen Gray

    I will go with answer #1. As far as family reunions, I haven’t had the opportunity to attend many as an adult, but have enjoyed the few I have attended.

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  10. Edward Arrington

    Wow, I think everyone is choosing 1. So am I. I had a car with auto-lock, but it only activated after I started the engine, put it in gear, and started moving. It did not lock simply by someone getting in and shutting the door. The other aspect is that it seems strange that someone intent on burglarizing a car would get in and shut the door. I think a burglar would lean in, grab what they can see, and make a fast getaway.

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      1. Edward Arrington

        Pat, I understand about the criminals. I’m simply questioning the auto-lock feature on the car. On the other hand, if the criminal was smart enough to break into the car, he should have been smart enough to get back out???

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  12. Paula Shreckhise

    I seem to be guessing #1 along with the rest of the folks. I just don’t think you can get locked in these days.
    My last family reunion was too long ago. We will try to get all the kids together this Thanksgiving. Our immediate family. It’s been ten years. And five more grandkids.

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      Patricia Bradley

      Hi Paula. The reunion was on my husband’s side. My side of the family meet at funerals and we just talk about getting together sometimes other than a funeral. We’ll see next week if y’all are right. 🙂

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  20. Phyllis Scott

    I believe it’s #1, I’m really hoping it’s only in extremely scared movies you can get locked in a car without the car in gear

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  23. Lual Krautter

    Hi. It appears it could be # 1. In regard to reunions, it all depends on the relatives, or friends, I guess, whether it will be a pleasant one! Thanks for the opportunity to enter a giveaway! Would love to win a print copy of your book!

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  25. Colleen H.

    I’m going to go with #2, even though the majority say #1…I know someone who managed to get locked in their car!

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  27. Betti Mace

    I really don’t know if you could get locked into your car and not be able to get out – a rather scary thought when you consider it. I will join the group and go with #1, but there sure are crazy criminals out there!
    I haven been to a family reunion for many years, but I still have fond memeories of that last one – 1988 I believe. We are obviously long overdue for another one!

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  30. Diane Nickerson

    It sounds like you had a good time reminiscing!!

    I really want to choose #1, simply because I have no clue how one could get locked IN the car (which means I’ll be doing a Google search after I post this to find out how that could happen!), but it seems a little too obvious. If that is the one you wrote, good job with the decoy. 😉 I think I will actually go with #3, though. Sometimes it is good to go against the tide. We’ll see if this is one of those times.

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