Chapter 33 Chapter Thirty-Three

They rushed to the scene of the autopsy.Puller thought that Dr. Walter Kellermann must have been a fat man in the past, but he was much thinner now.He attributed this to the doctor's slack facial skin and the four holes in the belt that had been left unused by the contracted abdomen. The bodies had been transferred from the funeral home to Dr. Kellerman's operating room.It was located behind the doctor's office, a small two-room brick house that had apparently been the residence of a certain family.It is less than two kilometers away from the town center.The corpses have been placed on portable soft cooling ice pads.

"Is this doctor sick or on a diet?" Puller whispered to Cole as they put on their surgical gowns. "It's a mix of both. He walks now, avoids meat, and eats very little at each meal. He had his gallbladder and left kidney removed a year ago. He understands that if he wants to live to be seventy years old, he has to do both. , not only pay attention to diet, but also exercise." "Have you been involved in an autopsy in the past?" Puller asked. "More than I'd hoped for," she replied. "Lindemann said that the last homicide in your area was ten years ago."

"They had to do autopsies for other reasons too. Most of them were accidents. Accidents happen a lot in mines. Car accidents, too." "Understood." "Also, if you're curious as to whether I'd throw up when he opened the body, I'll tell you right now: no." Dr. Kellerman had a neat white beard, blue eyes, thinning hair, and an affable and friendly demeanor.Introduced to Puller, the doctor said, "I was in the Air Force. Two years. In Vietnam. The GI Act gave me free schooling when I got out, so I went to school and got my medical degree." "Look, Uncle Sam does something right, too," Puller said.

"I never regret being in the military. It makes you stronger." "If you can make it through," Cole said. Puller saw a dead body already lying on the iron bed, covered with a sheet. "Who's the first?" "Colonel Reynolds." Kellerman glanced at the corpses on the ice mat. "I have two experienced assistants to help. Even so, it will be very late today." "We're just here to observe and maybe ask some questions," Kerr said. "You are welcome to watch from the sidelines, and you are welcome to ask questions. I did a preliminary look at the bodies this morning. Various types of wounds, interesting mix. Shotguns and small caliber pistols, strangled, and Trauma from blunt force trauma."

"Do you have any insight into how those two teenage children died?" Puller asked. "Probably killed with bare hands." "How can you be so sure?" Cole asked. "I can't say for sure. He asked me what my opinion is, it's just my opinion." "Why do you want to kill with your bare hands?" "If a bat, metal tool, or other object outside the body is used, it will almost certainly leave some residue on the skin, and the shape of the wound will also give away information. In one autopsy, I could identify it directly from the chest of the deceased. The logo of the Louisville baseball bat. Of course, killing people with bare hands can also leave some more obvious marks. In fact, I did find a little bit of something embedded in the skin of the boy's neck."

"What's that?" Puller asked. "Looks like remnants of black leather." "That means they wear gloves." "From what I've seen, it does." "It's not easy to find the right medulla to kill with bare hands." Puller nodded and said, "It's only a few centimeters long." "I'll admit, the guy you're after is trained. Martial arts, maybe." "Or special military training," Kerr said. "Well, army training." Kellerman agreed. He put on his mask, lifted the sheet covering the colonel's body, and picked up his equipment.

"let's begin?" Although with the help of two assistants, it took several hours to complete the autopsies of the seven corpses.Puller took samples throughout the process, put them in special little boxes, and carefully labeled them.The boxes will be sent to the Army Criminal Investigative Laboratory.He wanted to attach a specific instruction to each small box for those in the laboratory to refer to when analyzing the evidence.Not only that, but he had to email the lab another detailed and precise report and call them with reminders. Kellerman went home first after changing clothes, leaving behind two assistants to stitch up the body's Y-shaped incision.Cole and Pooler walk out of the operating room.Puller put the boxes in Cole's car.He also used a tape recorder to record many of the autopsies, and Cole also took a lot of notes in a notebook.But to be honest, the autopsy didn't reveal anything particularly noteworthy.

The plug remains of the shotgun bullets removed from Colonel Reynolds' head will be used to determine the caliber and model of the firearm.A small amount of white floc left on his face proved not to be from the bullet.Kellerman pointed out that this was the mark left by the killer who forced Reynolds to wear a blindfold. "Perhaps because of it, the colonel didn't make any defensive movements, he didn't even raise his hand," Puller said. "He couldn't see people shooting at him," Cole added. Reynolds' wife's upper body was covered in small pellets from shotgun shells.As they surmised, the two children died from external force on the back of their necks.Eric Triwell and Molly Pitra were both killed by headshots from .22 caliber pistols.The bullets that come out are in decent shape, it's just a matter of finding a pistol that matches them.

The blow to the head of Policeman Wellman was enough to knock him unconscious on the spot.His life didn't end abruptly when his neck was snapped, the basement ceiling was too low to provide room for the suspended body to drop sharply.Wellman died a slow death in agony of suffocation. Cole and Pooler leaned against the car.Cole pulled out a cigarette and lit it. "Don't look at me like that, Puller," she said. "I've been through seven autopsies. It's stressful." "The killers didn't leave too many clues," he said. "Have you formed an opinion?"

"As far as the current progress is concerned, it is difficult to form any clear view." She glanced at her watch. "My sister's dinner." "Why did she let me go too?" "I don't know, except that you are younger, taller, and stronger than her husband." "You mean she wasn't very faithful to her husband?" "I didn't say anything because I didn't know anything. Roger was often away." "Your sister doesn't seem to care much about death threats." "Roger isn't a very popular guy. I guess she's a little numb to the nasty things people say about Roger."

"She may be numb, but Roger is clearly not. He's mad as hell, and scared as hell." "Well, after all, the target of intimidation is him, not her." "It's true." "I'll drop you off at your parked car and pick you up at the hotel later. We'll all have to take a shower and change. I need a full scrub to get rid of the smell of dead people." "I don't think anyone can scrub that well." "I'm definitely going to give it a try."