Murder Mystery (true story)[/align][/align][/align]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. Here is the story: [/align][/align]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. [/align][/align]As he fell past the ninth floor, his life was interrupted by a shotgun
blast passing through a window, which killed him instantly. [/align][/align]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. " [/align][/align]Ordinarily," Dr Mills continued, "Someone 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. [/align][/align]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. [/align][/align]When one intends to kill subject "A" but kills subject "B" in the attempt,
one is guilty of the murder of subject "B." [/align][/align]When confronted with the murder charge, the old man and his wife were both
adamant, and both said that they thought the shotgun was not loaded. 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. [/align][/align]Therefore the killing of Mr. Opus appeared to be an accident; that is,
assuming the gun had been accidentally loaded. [/align][/align]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. [/align][/align]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. [/align][/align]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. [/align][/align]The son, Ronald Opus, had actually murdered himself. So the medical examiner
closed the case as a suicide. [/align][/align]A true story from Associated Press, (Reported by Kurt Westervelt)
[/align]

 

Wow..I wonder if MONK get's their story lines from this..

 

I don't think you could stage this even with help .. amazing series of events!

 

Great story... very entertaining and I was surprised to find out that it was TRUE!!!

 

Hey...I LOVE MONK!!!!

 

that definately has a Monk twist to it...talk about bizzaar!!

 

Was Cyril Wecht involved? [8D]

 

You guys are too gullible. Sorry, but not true....

http://www.snopes.com/horrors/freakish/opus.asp

 

After the firts paragraph, I knew where it was going because I have heard that before, or read it somewhere. That was well before 1994, so whenever I first encountered it must have been stemmed from the 1987 introduction of the story. At any rate, it does make for good reading and vivid use of your imagination.