http://192.168.2.6/english/CSI--尸体解剖.rm

The suburbs of Northern Virginia are tidy, quiet, safe. But even here not all deaths are natural.

"If you die and you come to our office, it's usually not a good thing."

Doctor Kathy Hayden is a medical examiner at the Northern Virginia District Office. This morning her first case seems simple. The body has apparent gunshot wounds in the head. But how was this man shot? The police say witnesses heard two gunshots. Was he killed by one bullet or two? Were these wounds self-inflicted? Or is it a homicide? Some of the evidence is right on the surface.

"Little scar there, you see, there are some slits there. That's much more consistent with an entrance wound."

But the real clues are inside the body.

"We look at all of the internal organs. We have to be very careful because they can be quite slippery."

When you routinely dissect the dead, the experience is far from everyday. For one thing, there is the smell.

"Most people complain about the smell the most, and when you put that together with a visual, then sometimes it can be hard."

"You have to try not to let your job interfere with your cooking, because it can be very similar."

But Kathy is willing to endure what she must to uncover the truth about the gunshot victim's death.

"This is the brain. There is massive damage incompatible with life. Even if he had made it to a hospital, they wouldn't have been able to save him."

The appearance of the wound has convinced Kathy that the man died from a single bullet, but did he shoot the gun himself? Or was he murdered? Kathy knows that her work tells the final chapter of their lives.

"First paragraph, my job is to tell the story of the victim, usually they don't lie."

The X-rays from the man with the gunshot wounds to the head confirm what Kathy has suspected: they were caused by a single bullet.

"You can actually see the skull fragment and a little debris field right along the wound track."

The first shot witnesses heard may simply have been fired to test the gun. What's more, the angle of the bullet's path is consistent with the self-inflicted wound.

"The direction of the bullet was going like this, this being the right side, right to left, slightly upward, and front to back."

The case can now be closed, this was a suicide.

"I have a gentleman in his forties who has a self-inflicted, a gunshot wound to head, um..."

As tragic as the end may have been, this person's life story is now complete.

"That's the best part about this job, I feel like I'm telling this person's last story, coz they can't anymore. The dead do have voices through us. See you guys tomorrow."

entrance wound: made by a bullet etc. where it enters the body