Forensic Science Znternutiond, 36 (1988) 51-67 Elsevier Scientific Publishers Ireland Ltd.

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A PATHOLOGIST’S VIEW OF TERRORIST VIOLENCE*

THOMAS MARSHALL

Professor of Forensic Medicine, Queen’s University, Belfast (U.K.)

Summary

The experience of the Northern Ireland State Pathology Service is drawn on to illustrate the forensic aspects of death by shooting and bombing caused by terrorists. The investigations into these deaths have to contend with rumours and allegations which can inflame feelings in the community or mislead the investigators and this aspect is dealt with. The conclusion is reached that when terrorist violence erupts there must be a forensic service able to cope and maintain the usual high standards of scientific investigation.

Key words: Terrorism; Forensic; Postmortem examination

Introduction

I am honoured to have been chosen by the President and Council of the Medico-Legal Society of Sri Lanka to give the Sixth ‘Dr. W. D. L. Fernando Memorial Oration’. Many of you here will remember Dr. David Fernando with great affection but for those who had not the privilege of meeting him, I can mention a few points of interest.

Dr. Fernando, like many forensic pathologists now working in Sri Lanka, did postgraduate study in Britain. He worked in Edinburgh, Scotland, during the period 1950-53 and was fortunate enough to study under Sir Sydney Smith. Then, after returning to this country, he became the Judicial Medical Officer, Colombo, in 1956 and he held the post until his retirement in 1971. During his time he became President of the Sri Lanka Medical Association, the College of Physicians, the Medico-Legal Society of Sri Lanka and a member of the General Council. Sadly, he died in 1978.

The practicalities of forensic medicine were of more concern to him than academic issues. He was highly ethical in his work and a loyal colleague. His personality was friendly and happy, one could say jovial, and this endeared him to graduates and undergraduates alike. His friends remember him as a good family man and I am pleased that Mrs. Fernando and his daughter, Kamilini, who is a lawyer, are here with us this evening.

Dr. Fernando had, even in his time, some experience of terrorism - mainly incidents involving hand bombs and petrol bombs - and he helped with the

*The sixth “Dr. W. D. L. Fernando Memorial Oration”.

03790738/88/$03.50 0 1988 Elsevier Scientific Publishers Ireland Ltd. Printed and Published in Ireland

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introduction of the Explosives and Firearms Act, 1966. I think he would have been very saddened by the way terrorism has taken an ugly turn in this coun- try since. But he would have been delighted that Sri Lanka has hosted this Congress and welcomed so many participants from abroad. Also, I have a feeling that he would have found it appropriate to have a memorial oration on Terrorism.

A pathologist’s view of terrorist violence

Sri Lanka is not alone. Terrorism is now a significant problem in many countries. It is organised by people dedicated to a political cause and willing to indulge in any kind of violence to support it. These terrorists come from all walks of life and they include professionals like ourselves. They have interna- tional connections and within the frontiers of their violent activities they often have the sympathy, if not the active support, of a significant section of the community. This frustrates the efforts of the security forces in their en- deavours to uproot the terrorists. In this climate, rumours find a fertile soil and they inflame feelings. Allegations made by one faction against another are common. The security forces, trying to keep the peace impartially, come under attack from all sides. It is against this peculiar background that terrorist violence has to be investigated. Investigated it must be. Remember that war has not been declared. Violence erupts in the course of an otherwise normal day. The injuries caused by terrorists are regarded as criminal, the deaths as homicidal. They must be investigated as such. It becomes apparent that this involves the forensic services quite heavily.

From the medico-legal viewpoint, interest centres on the way the injuries shed light on the violent incident and on the extent to which statements, allegations and rumours can be supported or refuted. I have come to realise this as I have worked during the recent violent times in Northern Ireland. What I am going to relate today is drawn from this experience but I believe that my remarks have a general applicability. I am sure you will find many similarities with the situation in Sri Lanka.

The rioting in Northern Ireland during the first half of 1969 produced nu- merous casualties but fortunately few deaths. The injured sustained bruises, abrasions and lacerations of a non-specific character by being kicked or struck by bricks, stones, bottles and truncheons. They were dealt with by the hospital casualty departments. Usually the injuries gave no clue to the agent respon- sible but just occasionally, a bruise or abrasion had a pattern reproducing the texture of a brick or stone, more rarely the outline of a missile such as a rubber bullet. These riot control weapons have caused a few deaths, as will any effective weapon, but as with drugs in medicine the occasional harm must be weighed against the general good.

My personal involvement came later in 1969 when firearms were brought out and deaths occurred as simple rioting gave way to gun battles. The autop- sies on these early victims were not difficult. They had been struck by only one

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bullet fired at fairly long range. There were no more than two wounds per body and it was no problem to distinguish the entrance from the exit wound. The typical entrance wound is a fairly neat round hole surrounded by a narrow collar of abrasions which is broader on one side if the bullet strikes obliquely. The typical exit wound is larger, more irregular in shape with some eversion of the marginal tissue and no border of abrasion.

There are confusing variations however. Some entrance wounds have no abrasion collar. Some look like exit wounds. Occasionally an entrance wound can mimic a stab wound. An exit wound can look like a laceration caused by a simple collapse. Conversely, some collapse injuries look like bullet wounds. Things are not always what they seem. There are always exceptions to the rule. Some shooting deaths seem to bear no injury at all; wounds are only revealed after a thorough examination. Wounds in the hair frequently present difficulty; the 0.22 bullet wound in particular is small and can be bloodless and at times it is revealed only when the scalp is reflected. There are other hidden areas of course. The back of the body should present no problem but one must not overlook the ears, mouth, the armpits and the genito-anal area.

This simple injury pattern changes when machine guns and quick-firing rifles are introduced, as happened in Northern Ireland in 1971. The victim might be struck by four, six or more bullets, some passing right through and others being arrested in the tissues. The firing might have come from two different sides and the victim might have spun as the bullets struck. In these circumstances a lot more thought must go into the diagnosis of entry and exit wounds and the grouping of them in pairs. This is a necessary exercise of course in order to help interpret the circumstances surrounding the death. As I have already mentioned, in times of civil strife information from the public is often hard to come by, either through perversity or fear of reprisal. There- fore, a lot rests on what can be gleaned from the scene and the body.

When witnesses do come forward, what they say must be carefully tested. Sometimes it turns out that the witness is honestly mistaken. One evening a man sitting at home said he heard two shots fired from a car passing down the street. He looked out of the window and saw a youth lying on the pavement. When he went to help him he found that the youth was dead. Now random shooting from a passing car is a common terrorist activity and the police accepted that the youth had died in this way. However, the autopsy showed it to be untrue; he had been assassinated. This is determined by two distinctive features; first, an entrance wound displaying smoke soiling and powder abra- sion, indicative of a close discharge, on the back or the front of the head. Secondly, another bullet wound in the side of the head, inflicted after the victim has collapsed, obviously at greater range. This is the final coup de grace. This youth had this pattern of injury. His death could not have been from a random ‘fire and run’ shooting; he had been confronted on the pavement and murdered in cold blood.

Another mistake was made after a man was found lying dead in the street during a gun battle between terrorists and the security forces. He had been hit

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by fragments of a bullet which had disintegrated after hitting a wall but his friend, who dragged the body into his house, alleged that he had been shot with a machine gun. For a layman the interpretation was perhaps not unreasonable but in times of civil unrest inaccurate statements such as this can cause a lot of trouble.

Our experience in Northern Ireland is that civil unrest polarises the com- munity and few are able to preserve an unbiased view of the situation. It is usual to interpret events to suit your way of thinking and a particular view- point is sometimes maintained in face of uncontrovertible evidence to the contrary. Every death becomes a propaganda tool from which the last drop of capital will be wrung and it is essential that an autopsy is carried out by an experienced, impartial pathologist to set the record straight. This next case, another of alleged machine gunning is illustrative.

One block of Corporation flats in Belfast overlooks a police station and it was a notorious gunman’s stronghold. One evening there was a gun battle with shooting at the police station from the flats and the return of fire by the police who claimed to have hit a gunman. In fact a man was taken from the flats by ambulance but on arrival at the hospital he was dead. I carried out an autopsy and found that he had been struck by one bullet. The entrance wound was on the right cheek and the exit wound on the left lower back. However, the family alleged that he had been sprayed with bullets from an armoured car as he helped an injured man. His father said that he had counted seven bullet wounds on the body when he identified it in the mortuary. Some newspapers published his story. This is one of the problems; by the time the true facts are made public the allegation has done its harm.

When the inquest was held, I described the two wounds on the body. The father challenged my evidence, not about the number of wounds this time but about the entry wound in the cheek. I produced the photographs but he was still not satisfied. Fortunately the Court was convinced. This kind of case illustrates the value of photography as corroborative evidence when it might be alleged that the pathologist is being untruthful or inaccurate; that he negligently failed to record all the injuries or deliberately overlooked them. In normal times such allegations would seem rather ridiculous but when terror- ism has the support of part of the community, any allegation, no matter how far-fetched, will always appeal to one or other side.

These allegations inflame feelings. They can raise the corporate aggression of a district to riot pitch, an atmosphere in which terrorism flourishes. Then gunmen come out onto the street. Retaliation leads to captures and torture. The victim is bound, often with a ligature round the neck, beaten about the head, beaten with a rod, branded with an iron. To many, the final bullet must come as a merciful release. Even then the body can be further mutilated by having the throat cut or by being stabbed.

More trouble arises when an innocent person is shot accidentally during a gun battle between the security forces and terrorists. It is then likely that a vociferous section of the community will blame the death on the police or

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soldiers. Recovery of the bullet might then determine the issue. The forensic scientists can determine the kind of weapon which fired it and if weapons are available for test firing they can probably say which one.

However, finding a bullet lodged in the tissues can be very difficult at times and an X-ray of the body is often obligatory. The track of a bullet through the shoulder, back or thigh can be impossible to trace by dissection alone and when only an entrance wound is visible as a reference point, the pathologist might be lost after he has dissected only an inch or two. Sometimes the bullet lodges in a poorly-accessible place such as the spine, the marrow cavity of a long bone, the knee joint or foot bones where obviously it cannot be felt. But even when a bullet lies in soft tissue it is not easily palpated. Half an inch of soft tissue round a bullet makes its detection very difficult indeed and I have failed to find a 7.62-mm bullet in soft lung tissue until an X-ray convinced me that it was there.

When terrorism arises in a divided community the security forces are in a difficult position. Whatever they do, they cannot please everyone. Our army in particular, has a difficult job. For political reasons it is not usually allowed to fight as it has been trained to do. In Northern Ireland the frustration of the soldiers out in the streets must have been intense as they tried to cope with riot situations with kid gloves. They have on the whole behaved with truly remark- able restraint in the face of great provocation. It comes as no surprise, there- fore, that occasionally a patrol displays less than perfect humanitarian conduct and covers up by concocting an untruthful story. But the pathologist must remain impartial.

One such occasion concerned four terrorists in a car who fired at, and wounded, two pedestrians. A patrol of soldiers was nearby and as the car sped past them on the other side of the street, the soldiers fired at it. The car went out of control and crashed further up the road. According to the soldiers no more shots were fired by either side. As the soldiers ran to the car the passen- gers ran away but they found the driver dead in his seat. So they said. The autopsy showed that a bullet had struck the driver’s right ear and had blown a large exit hole in the right posterior quadrant of the skull. However, there were abrasions on the right temple, cheek and nose and discharge soiling in the area which showed that the bullet had been fired at very close range; one quite inconsistent with the soldiers’ story.

Explosion deaths

Another popular expression of terrorism is the bomb which can be used to terrorise the community at large, to attack members of a group such as an army unit, police patrol, an assembly of politicians or a religious group or to kill specific individuals. We have seen the lot in Ulster as you have in Sri Lanka.

Bombs come in many different shapes and sizes. They are usually made of commercial explosive. Large quantities of explosives are used quite legally in

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most countries in quarries, construction work and agriculture and it is not surprising that this is stolen to make terrorist bombs. It was the source of the early anti-personnel bombs used by the I.R.A. Nail bombs were made by wrap- ping a 2-02 stick of gelignite with corrugated cardboard and pushing d-in. nails down the corrugations before binding the cylinder with strong adhesive tape. A detonator was inserted into the charge and to this was attached 3 in. of safety fuse.

The earliest and simplest anti-property devices were fire-bombs consisting of an incendiary mixture, a source of ignition and a simple timing mecha- nism, all packed into a small container such as a cigarette packet or tape cassette box. Hundreds of these devices were used by the I.R.A. They were planted in department stores, shops and offices shortly before closing time and the fires they started after the premises had been vacated did enormous damage to property. Occasionally someone was trapped and died from the varying effects of the fire. Avoiding action had to be taken and, as you are having to do here, shops, offices and public buildings now employ thousands of security personnel to frisk everyone and check handbags and parcels of everyone entering buildings. Shops are searched by the staff before they close up for the night.

To blow up buildings, the I.R.A. at first used small charges of a few pounds of explosive, a detonator and a length of safety fuse. The bomb, in a package or bag, would be carried into a building and after lighting the fuse the terror- ists would tell the occupants they had three minutes to get out. Occasionally someone braver or more foolhardy than the rest would carry the bomb out into the street where it caused less damage.

The next development was the time bomb using a cheap watch or alarm clock mechanism. Bombs with these devices were mass produced. The army was called in to deal with them and their success only prompted the I.R.A. to build more complex bombs with anti-handling devices so that the bomb would explode if left alone, lifted or interfered with.

Then came the ‘letter’ bombs. At first, a small package of commercial explo- sive was concealed in a hole cut in the pages of a booklet and furnished with an electrical detonator and small flat battery. When the booklet was with- drawn from the envelope the detonating circuit was completed and the bomb exploded. More recent ‘letter’ bombs react to daylight.

As commercial explosive became more strictly controlled in Northern Ire- land and the Republic, explosives were improvised from agricultural and in- dustrial chemicals. Sodium chlorate and sugar was popular. This is used in the pipe bomb which consists of about 18 in. of 2.5 in. diameter heavy iron pipe with steel plates welded to each end to seal it. It is filled with about 3 lb of the mixture. It is ignited with safety fuse and has a devastating effect. A more recent development has been to pack 10 lb of the mixture into a small CO, cylinder, the type used to pressurise beer in public houses.

Sodium chlorate and sugar is a low explosive and explodes only when it is confined but other mixtures form very efficient high explosives. One such is sodium chlorate and nitrobenzene. Ammonium nitrate used in quantity in

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agriculture, also forms the basis of an efficient explosive and diesel oil will act as a suitable fuel for it.

Once the I.R.A. had developed these home-made explosives which they ob- tained by the sackful, there was no need to use less than this for each bomb. Motor cars had been stolen to transport the earlier bombs of 20-40 lb commer- cial explosive which were carried into buildings. Now they use the car itself as the container; up to 700 lb of home-made explosive is packed into the hi-jacked car, driven to its target and left to explode in the street. To deal with this problem most vehicles are prohibited from entering the central areas of cities and towns by barriers; those that must do so are vigorously searched by secu- rity personnel. In many other areas no vehicle must be parked without some- body in it. When an empty car is seen in a prohibited zone it is immediately suspect. The police are notified and they inspect the interior through the windows. If there is any chance that it could be a car bomb, the Army Techni- cal Branch is called and they use their remote controlled robot to carry out a ‘controlled explosion’. The robot breaks a window and places a small amount of explosive inside the car. This blows the car open. Many a country farmer, not conversant with the law, has parked his car in Belfast and returned from the shops to find his car a wreck. Not only can he not claim any insurance but he is liable’to prosecution for leaving his car unattended.

Another way of dealing with the car bomb menace is for the security forces to set up road blocks for about 30 min, here and there, to carry out spot checks on vehicles. This has made the transport of a bomb more risky and the terror- ists have retaliated by planting the bomb by proxy. They will hi-jack a car containing two people, perhaps man and wife, and hold one hostage whilst the other is ordered to drive the car, after being laden with explosive, to the target and leave it there.

A favourite attack by the I.R.A. on the security forces is to blow up a mobile patrol as it makes its way along a country road. Home-made explosive is packed in containers such as milk churns and placed in culverts carrying the road over small streams or in hedges. Hundreds of pounds of explosive are used and the craters are enormous. These bombs are detonated by remote control by terrorists at a vantage point. They use either a command wire or radio signal.

Attacks on individuals are most frequently carried out by booby-trapping motor cars. Bombs are fixed with magnets under the car or inside the wheel arch, to go off when the car is moved. Those of us who are vulnerable are urged to check our cars before we get into them.

Of course, when booby-trapped cars explode innocent people in the vicinity can also be injured. A part-time member of our Army Reserve parked his car overnight in a lay-by outside his house. The next morning he set off to take his son and daughter to school. After travelling a few yards a bomb exploded beneath the front wheel arch. It had been triggered by fishing line attached to the valve on the wheel. He and his daughter died at the scene. His son was blown out but survived. Another little girl died in a similar incident. She was being taken to school and the car blew up when the driver’s door was opened. Her father survived but she was badly mangled.

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Our terrorists have displayed a certain ingenuity with other types of booby trap. Many are laid in buildings to which the security forces are lured and they are actuated by trip wires, pressure switches and photo-electric cells. When an army patrol was checking out a village hall after being told that arms were hidden there, a box was found in the toilet and it blew up when the soldier opened it. Another &lb bomb was placed above a ceiling of a landing in a block of flats. It was detonated by radio when a patrol of soldiers were checking the building. A policeman was killed when he lifted a manhole cover in a path at the rear of some houses. A certain amount of daring was required to plant a bomb under an army sergeant’s bed on the upper floor of a barrack block well within a military area. The bomb went off when he sat down on the bed.

In what the terrorists see as a war situation, they justify these attacks on the army and police as part of their fight against the Government. The justifi- cation for attacks on civilians is more tenuous. Sometimes they claim that the individual had some association with the security forces but in other instances they are doing nothing more than terrorising the community at large. We have many small villages with a single main road lined by shops and houses and a car bomb left in the street can have a devastating effect on the community. In towns and cities a car exploding in a street causes relatively less structural damage but the casualties are likely to be higher. For instance, when a car bomb exploded in Donegall Street in the city centre, 54 people were injured and seven died. When a deadly device of gelignite and petrol exploded on the window ledge of a function room of a Belfast hotel one evening when the room was filled with dog fanciers having their Annual Dinner, blast and flame en- gulfed the room and the hotel was destroyed. Twelve died and 28 were injured. Drinking bars are frequently attacked. When the Mountainview Tavern in Belfast was blown up there were 66 casualties. A bomb was once planted on the Belfast-Portadown train, in a toilet at one end of a carriage. Fortunately the carriage was not full and only three people were injured. One girl died; she was blown out onto the track.

Over the years our terrorists have developed more and more powerful devices and they can now manufacture homemade mortar bombs which they fire from tubes arranged in the back of lorries. These are usually used to attack police stations. The worst incident, in which nine mortar bombs were fired 300 yd over a busy shopping area, caused the death of nine police officers when one mortar bomb landed on the canteen.

It is not surprising that every now and again a terrorist gets blown up. Those who understand football will know what we mean when we refer to this as an ‘own goal’. Many houses, used as bomb factories, have been damaged when a bomb went off prematurely. Cars have exploded when terrorists have been transporting a bomb. Terrorists have died whilst planting a bomb at the target.

Although these bombs generate tremendous forces they are still much less powerful than the aerial bombs and torpedoes used in war. Both the explosive charge and the container are less efficient and whilst severe injury and death can occur it is usually only to people in the immediate vicinity.

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Complete disruption only occurs when a person is carrying a large bomb or sitting with it. The body can then be blown to bits and the parts are scattered over an area of perhaps 200 yds. radius. Most people in the vicinity of a bomb explosion remain mainly in one piece. Areas of the body can be badly mangled and parts of limbs can be blown off but the body remains sufficiently intact to conduct a satisfactory examination and to detect the injury specific to bomb explosions: a triad of small discrete bruises and abrasions along with puncture lacerations.

These injuries are due to the violent impact of very small particles. Some- times a larger fragment penetrates the body and causes death, occasionally when a person is a considerable distance from the explosion. On one such occasion a police woman was walking across the road when a 7-lb bomb ex- ploded on a window sill blowing out some windows in the shops around. She was struck by a fragment of sheet metal, 1 in. x 0.5 in., and was the only casu- alty. A baby was being wheeled in his pram along a pavement when a bomb exploded two streets away. The reverberation dislodged a sheet of plate glass from a window above and it fell, striking the child’s head edge-on. Had it landed 2 in. to one side, the child would have lived. Learning of these cases tends to make one a fatalist.

Many victims are inside a building which is demolished by the bomb but apart from the heavy soiling by dust, grit, splinters and grease, the injuries they receive from the collapsing structures do not differ from those we see in accident victims. If a fire starts, the victims can be severely burned but the bomb itself will do little more than singe the eyebrows and hair. The situation is different when a bomb factory blows up. Then, chemicals lying about ignite with a momentary flash of very high temperature and people in the room can have their outer clothing burned off and can sustain extensive uniform-depth flash burns.

Blast quickly comes to mind when bombs are mentioned. It received consid- erable attention during the Second World War as bombs and torpedoes got ever bigger. But to be injured by blast from a terrorist bomb one has to be in the immediate vicinity, within a few feet, of the explosion. Then, although the blast can bruise the larynx and cause haemorrhage into the lungs, the victim is likely to die at the scene from the other injuries and blast damage found by the pathologist is usually of little significance.

As with deaths from shooting there are a number of problems facing the investigators. First, of course, the victims must be identified. Fortunately most are identifiable by visual inspection but there are problems when there is severe mutilation, particularly of the head. Then help can be obtained from distinctive clothing although its appearance can be greatly altered by impreg- nation with plaster and grit. Rings on the fingers are sometimes helpful and also tattoos. On some occasions the teeth and fingerprints have to be examined.

Reconstructing the circumstances of the incident can be the most rewarding part of the investigations. As with deaths from shooting, it is not unusual for

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an explosion to be followed by rumours and allegations which the pathologist can often confirm or refute. When a bomb goes off prematurely, perhaps whilst being manufactured, loaded into a car or primed and a terrorist is killed, it might be alleged by the relatives that he was an innocent passerby. When a bomb goes off whilst being transported by car it might be said that a terrorist blown out of the car was an innocent pedestrian. When a bomb goes off in a restaurant or a bar some of the dead might be terrorists carrying the bomb whilst others are innocent victims. It is thus important to discover the relative positions of the victims and the bomb.

These questions are often answered by comparing the injuries on the vic- tims, particularly their severity, distribution and pattern. Interpretation relies on two cardinal laws: (I) Explosive force declines rapidly and only those very near to the source are badly mutilated. (II) Explosive force is very directional and it is frequently possible to say where the seat of the explosion was.

When a bomb factory in a house blew up, a man was found dead on the street. He was said by his friends to have just been passing at the time but the injuries show that he must have been in the room. When a parked car blew up, two men were found dead nearby. They were both mutilated so severely that they must have been in the car. The injuries showed clearly that one man must have been in the front passenger seat with the bomb to his right. The other man must have been in the driver’s seat with the bomb on his lap. An explosion at ground level injures the legs of those nearby more than other parts of the body. When a person is bending down over the bomb when it goes off there is a specific pattern of injury. In one such case it was clear how the umbilicus had been spared by being enclosed in a skin fold. When a person is killed by a parcel bomb there are often linear injuries crossing the face and neck, radiat- ing in a way which clearly shows the point of the explosion.

Occasionally victims are so disintegrated that they are only identified after a careful search. In practice one starts with the bodies sufficiently intact to count and only later is attention turned to the bits and pieces which are collected from the surrounding area. This unpromising material must be washed and carefully examined in the hope of uncovering helpful evidence. It is surprising what turns up.

On one occasion a bomb went off as it was being loaded into a car and as well as demolishing a house and damaging the road, it scattered human re- mains over a distance of 100 yd. Four identifiable bodies were recovered and a mound of flesh which, piled high, was more than one mortuary trolley would hold. It took almost a week to sort it out. We found the skin of a face which we thought would be easily identified after we have moulded it round a ball of cotton wool but before it was, a young man wrongly identified the victim as his sister. Then there were three trolley loads of recognisable pieces of scalp, skin, limb and spine. Finally, a pile of scraps, some 47 lb weight in all, and it was the examination of this which yielded two prostate glands and two uterine cervixes. Obviously the explosion had killed four more victims, two men and two women.

Conclusions

We know about man’s inhumanity to man but it needs pictures such as these to remind us what that phrase can really mean. Today, as I have illustrated terrorist violence, I have not tried to be horrific. I have done no more than show you a cross section of injuries sustained by victims of terrorism in North- ern Ireland and likely to be sustained by victims of terrorism wherever it may erupt.

Northern Ireland has endured violence by the bullet and the bomb for about 17 years now. What lessons in the medico-legal field can I say we have learnt? I want to mention two today.

Firstly, it is important to have a good forensic pathology service which can cope. Forensic pathologists are everywhere in short supply and it is virtually impossible to obtain additional trained staff to meet a rapidly growing need. During the worst period in Northern Ireland, 1971-75, only three forensic pathologists were in post with no possibility of increasing the number. There were moments in 1972-73 when we thought the forensic pathology service would break but fortunately we were able to hold on without an increase in staff.

Secondly, one must continue to carry out the investigations impeccably. When the police and pathologists are presented with three, four or five victims of shooting, or eight bodies from a bombed hotel at a time when there is the smell of civil war in the air, it is not unnatural for them to consider doing the minimum and tightening their belts in preparation for something similar the next day. To do this is perilous. Our experience in Northern Ireland has been that 3 or 4 years later, when the situation has settled to a semblance of normal- ity, perpetrators of these outrages are orought before the Courts and their conviction then depends on the same high standard of the evidence as does any murder case in normal times. The police and pathologists cannot then give excuses for having cut their corners at the time of the autopsy because work was pressing. If the prosecution founders because they failed to maintain their standards, the fact that they were working in a near-war situation will not exonerate them.

I realise that I have painted an appalling picture of violence and I cannot leave you without restoring the perspective. As each of our violent years has passed, the number killed during the civil disturbances has always been less than those who died on our roads and the number injured has only been about one third of our road injured. It is much safer to visit Belfast and other places in Northern Ireland than it is to visit many well-known cities in other coun- tries, especially places like Chicago, Dallas, Washington and Detroit in the U.S.A. Should you come to Northern Ireland you would experience some basic security measures but you would find life going on normally and you would enjoy your visit as a tourist. The situation is very comparable with that in Colombo today. And as in Sri Lanka, a warm welcome awaits you.