re: Officer in Eric Garner case: I never used a choke hold

quote:

---

Care to answer the question as to differentiating autopsy results between obstructive vs compression asphyxia? Differences, if any, between autopsy presentations of endogenous vs atraumatic exogenous airway obstruction?

---

You're obviously far more versed on this from an anatomical standpoint so I'm not going to try to bluff my way out of this.

The finding of homicide by check and neck compression, however, isn't an unheard of thing. The fact that this is a relatively well-known risk within law enforcement circles precludes the argument that it's accidental to some degree. When you have a known risk and you act in ways that accentuate the risk, in this case - neck and chest compression, it's difficult to argue that it's a complete surprise that he died.

The finding of an asphyxia death isn't solely a pathological finding. To some degree, it's a finding of exclusion. There are many people who have asphyxiated who don't present with hematomas. Atypical compression includes the violent pulling back of the head in the forearm in a pincer move. This is noted in the intro to this paper:

LINK

And some more fun on the topic:
LINK