Window of Time for Nichols murder

[Patrick S]

Once more no, this is not what we should discuss. The case is a very rich one with all sorts of angles and tons of information. If that is not enough for you without adding material about what you perceive to be moral shortcomings on my behalf, then you must discuss with somebody else. Those are the rules and yes, I have established them. Fifteen minutes ago, as it were. Take it or leave it.

Not a problem for me.

[Patrick S]

Hi herlock.
love you buddy but your wrong on this one. I had a similar thing happen to me. I surprised someone who had just knocked a dude out in a dark parking lot, and he acted like he was helping him out and asked me to go get help. When i got back with a cop the knocked out dude was waking up and had been robbed by the other guy. The guy could have run away, i was about 25 yards away when he noticed me, but he chise to bluff it out. Now he didnt go wit me to find the cop, but he didnt run away right away either.

Sounds like a harrowing thing all around. I think that it's worth pointing out that Cross tried his supposed bluff without Paul having witnessed anything suspicious at all. In fact, Paul didn't see Nichols and tried to walk past Cross, whereas you came upon the assailant during the commission of the crime itself. In any event. Glad you came out okay.

[Abby Normal]

Sounds like a harrowing thing all around. I think that it's worth pointing out that Cross tried his supposed bluff without Paul having witnessed anything suspicious at all. In fact, Paul didn't see Nichols and tried to walk past Cross, whereas you came upon the assailant during the commission of the crime itself. In any event. Glad you came out okay.

Thanks patrick.
yeah only got a bruised ego, as i felt stupid i had been fooled.

[Fisherman]

Sounds like a harrowing thing all around. I think that it's worth pointing out that Cross tried his supposed bluff without Paul having witnessed anything suspicious at all. In fact, Paul didn't see Nichols and tried to walk past Cross, whereas you came upon the assailant during the commission of the crime itself. In any event. Glad you came out okay.

I see no reason to tell the two apart. Abby was not aware that a crime was being committed and came upon the perp at the crime site. Paul was not aware that a crime was being committed and came upon the perp at the crime site (accepting that Lechmere was the killer).

It is the same thing, basically.

[rjpalmer]

Blood would not have clotted though simultaneously with pulse loss (estimates could run to thirty minutes or more if cold and a clotting disorder)

If a person dies suddenly, it takes longer for their blood to start clotting. This, according to Dr. Cox.

https://www.forensicjournals.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/Postmortem-Hemorrhage-Feb.pdf

[Fisherman]

If a person dies suddenly, it takes longer for their blood to start clotting. This, according to Dr. Cox.

https://www.forensicjournals.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/Postmortem-Hemorrhage-Feb.pdf

In the Nichols case, it is not so much about clotting as it is about bleeding out. Jonas Mizen said that the blood in the pool was partly coagulated when he saw it, and it makes very good sense if Lechmere was the killer and if Mizen arrived at the murder site around seven minutes after the carmen had left the body - blood will start coagulating immediately as it leaves a wound, but although there is an ongoing process it will not be visibly coagulating until around four minutes after the bloodshed starts. So if there was still blood running at that stage, then the fresh blood would not be coagulated whereas the blood that had left the wound more than four minutes earlier would be visibly so.
What importance for the case do you ascribe to the article you refer to?

[rjpalmer]

Hi Fisherman. This has probably been dealt with before, but I couldn't help noticing that in the documentary everyone pronounces the "Lech" in "Lechmere" as if it rhymed with wretch, or fetch, or catch.

However, in Boston, U.S.A., there is a Lechmere Square (not too far from MIT). We all pronounced it "Leck-mere," the lech rhyming with heck, deck, neck, Gregory Peck. To me, that is the correct way.

Who has it right?

You'll hear the woman pronouncing Lechmere Square at the beginning of the following short video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z7eoAKEXyB4

[rjpalmer]

What importance for the case do you ascribe to the article you refer to?

Two points. Cox states that postmortem bleeding can last for a "considerable time," and mentions cases where a body is still bleeding significantly when on an autopsy slab. The bigger the wound, the more it will bleed. He also seems to indicate that the phenomenon has not been well studied and there are considerable uncertainties in how long it can last. How could it be otherwise? One seldom gets the opportunity to put a stopwatch to a corpse that is slowly bleeding out. I would hope the physician would be more interested in trying to revive the victim.

I am just slightly skeptical about these various estimations of how long Nichols was dead, especially considering that Mackenzie was still bleeding from her wounds 20+ minutes after the body had been discovered, yet Phillips insisted she had died almost instantly.

[Fisherman]

Hi Fisherman. This has probably been dealt with before, but I couldn't help noticing that in the documentary everyone pronounces the "Lech" in "Lechmere" as if it rhymed with wretch, or fetch, or catch.

However, in Boston, U.S.A., there is a Lechmere Square (not too far from MIT). We all pronounced it "Leck-mere," the lech rhyming with heck, deck, neck, Gregory Peck. To me, that is the correct way.

Who has it right?

You'll hear the woman pronouncing Lechmere Square at the beginning of the following short video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z7eoAKEXyB4

The name has Flemish origin, actually, and has been spelt in a number of ways, one of them being Letchmere. That leads me to think that the correct pronounciation in English (which will at any rate have differed from the Flemish pronounciation) rhymes with fetch and wretch.

[Fisherman]

Two points. Cox states that postmortem bleeding can last for a "considerable time," and mentions cases where a body is still bleeding significantly when on an autopsy slab. The bigger the wound, the more it will bleed. He also seems to indicate that the phenomenon has not been well studied and there are considerable uncertainties in how long it can last. How could it be otherwise? One seldom gets the opportunity to put a stopwatch to a corpse that is slowly bleeding out. I would hope the physician would be more interested in trying to revive the victim.

I am just slightly skeptical about these various estimations of how long Nichols was dead, especially considering that Mackenzie was still bleeding from her wounds 20+ minutes after the body had been discovered, yet Phillips insisted she had died almost instantly.

Yes, exactly - the bigger the wound, the more it will bleed. And the more open the wound, the faster it will flow. And when you cut ALL vessels in the neck, no vessel spasm can occur, stopping the bloodflow - or so Jason Payne-James told me.
I do think that stopwatches will have been used at beheadings of criminals, and that there will be such records available. I´ll see if I can find one or two.
MacKenzie did not have anything at all to compare with Nichols when it comes to the severity of the cutting. I am not surprised that MacKenzie bled for a much longer period. Her left carotid artery was severed, while the rest of the large vessels in the neck seems to have been left untouched. I cannot remember which exact vessel it was that ensured a quick bleeding out, but I can try to find what Payne-James said on the matter.
This may take some substantial time, but I will get back to you.

[Patrick S]

I see no reason to tell the two apart. Abby was not aware that a crime was being committed and came upon the perp at the crime site. Paul was not aware that a crime was being committed and came upon the perp at the crime site (accepting that Lechmere was the killer).

It is the same thing, basically.

So you judge that the man Abby interrupted having knocked out someone out and in the act of robbing someone was, perhaps, a narcissist psychopath who could have chosen to walk away - even though Abby was looking directly at him - but instead reasoned to "bluff it out" for the thrill? Further, it seems as if this fellow's "bluff" was designed to remove Abby from the immediate situation so that he could... wait for it now.... ESCAPE... which he did. You have Lechmere HEARING, not SEEING, Paul from 40 yards off in your echo chamber, Paul has seen neither Lechmere nor his victim (Abby saw both). When Paul does arrive, Lechmere doesn't send him to find a PC so he can make his escape, he asks him to come see, inspects his victim with Paul, and then goes with Paul to find a PC.

[Fisherman]

Here´s a VERY quick one for you, R J. I found that Kjab, a medico posting out here called Paul, wrote this: "A cut vein, unlike an artery does not spasm so will continue to bleed until a clot forms or there is insufficient pressure to overcome gravity."

So Payne-James will have spoken of a vein in all probability - I do remember that he offered that insight when I wrote to him about how posters out here said that there could have been vessel spasms hindering the bleeding out. Not so, said Payne-James!

[Fisherman]

Here´s a passage that is interesting. It is written by a retired physician/scientist named George Corrent in response to a question about decapitation on another internet discussion site. He speaks theoretically about a case where all the neck vessels are cut but the spine left intact, which is exactly what we have in the Nichols case:
"... let's say you just severed all the major blood vessels that pass through the neck, but left the head on the body (spine is still intact). Internal and external carotid arteries x2, internal and external jugular veins x2, 2 vertebral arteries and veins in the back of the neck, a holy host of smaller arteries and veins like the thyroid arteries/veins, but they are mostly branches off the carotids, so if the carotids are empty, so are they. You have about 5 liters of blood in an average size human (varies by body weight), and the heart pumps about 2–3? liters per min. - not all of that is going to the brain, but the veins are draining pretty fast too, …. So I'd guess you'd lose 2–3 liters in the first minute. Blood loss would slow down very rapidly because blood pressure would drop to zero quickly from hypovolemia and the heart would stop beating quickly also."

I checked the bloodflow rate through the heart since there was a question mark at it. Five to six quarters of a gallon per minute is the number, so around or just over two liters. My own guess - much led on by Llewellyns words - is that there was never any two liter bloodloss in a single minute from the neck. There would have been arterial spray and a very sizeable bloodpool under her if that was the case (although if she had been strangled and the heart had stopped beating that would change the picture as for the spray). I think the abdominal cutting came first.

[rjpalmer]

"A cut vein, unlike an artery does not spasm so will continue to bleed until a clot forms or there is insufficient pressure to overcome gravity."

So why wouldn't the precise angle of the body be highly relevant in any estimation? Another unknowable. Nichols' head was clearly "aimed" downhill, but how much so?

[Fisherman]

"A cut vein, unlike an artery does not spasm so will continue to bleed until a clot forms or there is insufficient pressure to overcome gravity."

So why wouldn't the precise angle of the body be highly relevant in any estimation? Another unknowable. Nichols' head was clearly "aimed" downhill, but how much so?

The position of the body would be vital to the proceedings, of course. Nichols was flat on her back, and the wound in he neck was a gaping one, so there would have been no obstacle to the bloodflow there. She would keep bleeding like an open bottle until gravity dictated otherwise what blood there was inside the body at a loweer level than that of the wound would remain in her.
I don´t know what you mean when saying that her head was clearly aimed downhill...?

To me, the equation is a simple one. There seems to have been no discernible obstacle for the bloodflow, and she would therefore reasonably have bled out in a matter of minutes. That is the likely thing and simple solution, but there is a long queue of people lining up to express all sorts of objections, more or less credible ones. No definitive certainty can be had, but what we DO have is bad news for the carman the way I see it.