Decapitated!

Actually, decapitated doesn't really apply here. This is an avulsion case.

Case: man running from the police on foot, on an elevated highway. They get close, and he hops over the concrete guardwall.

Last thing he ever did.

Warning! The photos below the fold are quite graphic.

Judging by the damage shown in the photos, I would say that he had the misfortune to have a wrought-iron fence stake penetrate his neck and sever the spinal column. The remaining tissue was then unable to take the force required to stop his body, so his head avulsed from the neck. Avulsion is a tearing of the flesh, decapitation implies cutting the head off.

This is a very unusual incident, both from the standpoint of the law of unintended consequences (sometimes known as Murphy's Law), and from a medical standpoint.

Don't even bother to jack me up because the person appears to be of color. I would have published the photos regardless of his race.

Kudos to Catfish for bringing these to my attention.

Now where's the fire truck for the washdown?

Comments

[Bob]

he hung off the side and dropped that is why he is facing the bridge. I think your head will come off in this situation regardless of your race or why you where jumping. If you are racist no body cares what you think, so please all racist homophobes keep stringing them sentences together I am shocked you can do so.

[metal fence]

Wow!! Very graphic. I doubt he suffered though.

[unknown]

It is not faked, this is fact. I've been to the location which is the Edgewood I75/85 overpass in Atlanta. The metal fence remains bent from the impact.

[Neil]

I hope he didn't suffer.

[Smith]

Well I know the victim and the victim was a friend and he also helped alot of people in the communities in NY, Nassau County to be exact. The photos should have never been release do to the fact that he has children and they now also have children so to see this online still in 2009 is horrible and every person that made negative statement I pray this never happens to anyone you know. Yes the police have a job to do, but at the same time the release of the video shows the purpose in which they intended, which was to show what the can do, CAUSE A MAN TO JUMP TO HIS DEATH, oh ATL police are wonderful now lets just pray they aren't pushes to jump. The officer with the comments do us a favor here in NY, keep them off the internet you know no longer have a badge my friend.. Pray for these people. Those that said it isn't real trust me it is real his wife and children live with this everyday of there lives. pray for them that they don't lead the same life as Gilly did. Nuff respect to all those still holding his family down.

ED. NOTE: Strong emotions here, but emotions don't trump common sense OR the laws of gravity. Basically, if you run from the cops, you will simply die while out of breath. Gravity made the process quicker in this case. Censoring the Internet because gruesome photos are printed there makes no sense, either. The reason this blog presented these photos is simply to show that for bad decisions, there are usually bad consequences. That is a simple lesson that we ALL used to know, but in the last two or three generations, there is a feeling that we can be shielded from our own bad decisions. That does not happen in real life, only in the movies.

[Steve from the 913]

To be honest, to all you people saying, how is his body on the same side of the fence his face is looking, think about the fact that he may have fallen at a angle. Thus making contact with the back side of his neck/ skull first. That explains that.

[maegan]

i don't know what 2 say but i have 2 agree that it might be fake cuse how would the body be on that side of the fence. the body would of fell on the other side of the fence becuse of how the head is faced. but i heard that the cops twisted the head 4 the pics 2 be takin.

[CSI Joker 1822]

This happened in Atlanta. Just so everyone knows. Check it!
http://www.snopes.com/photos/gruesome/decapitation.asp#photo

[Skeptic]

Faked. Look closely at the detail of the photo immediately below his chin. It's fuzzy and some fence surface (bottom of the horizontal rail) is missing.

Also, his body ends up on the side of the fence his head is facing? How? Did his head spin around on the post as the body ripped free? Doesn't look like there's room between the adjacent upright posts for that to have happened.

[STummy]

eeewWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW!

[Torment Faktory]

I see a lot of judgement being passed on this guy by people who have absolutely no idea what the surrounding circumstances in this situation were. What do you know about this poor guy anyway? Do you really feel qualified to judge whether or not he deserved such a horrible end based on the photo's of his death scene and the situational description written by some person who quite possibly has absolutely no idea what happened in the series of events that led to this mans death? I used to think mankind had come a long way socialy since the days of witch hunts. Apparently not. What if you were one of this guy's family members and just happened across this site?

ED. NOTE: With a few exceptions, when the cops are chasing someone, and that someone is trying to get away from them, the matter is NOT about wanting to extend or refuse invitations to a church ice-cream social. It's about FELONIES, severe crimes against other people. When such a chasee does the Big Stupid and kills himself by first jumping over a three-story high guardwall, then landing on an iron-picket fence, most of us who value the culture and it's protection will say, "meh, another example of Natural Selection".

Torment Faktory, with your statements, you demonstrate the credentials of someone who DOES NOT value the culture and it's protection. But then again, you weren't the one robbed, or raped, or had your store ripped off by the offender. Or he didn't try to sell YOUR kids any dope, so you feel OK with supporting HIS case against that of the society you belong to.

Sorry, bud, I ain't buying it. Cry that tear-river somewhere else, the salt water is killing my fine suburban lawn.

[steve]

Where is this ? So many of these turn out to be spoofs.

ED NOTE: By my experiences, I would say that the photos ARE CSI investigative photographs, and on that basis, I figure it's real. I shot a lot of CSI photos in my police career, and can tell by the angles, etc that the photos are all shot of the same subject.

Can't tell you whose police files they reside in, though.

Just by the look of the area, local buildings, etc, I would say that this happened either in the NE Corridor or the Upper Midwest.

[Big Ed]

To all of you passing judgement on this guy... I can't wait to see how you turn out on your judgement day.. I will admitt that this guy probably was high as hell when he did this dumb act, but i can't see how color has to do with this. If that was the case; I would say he... it looks like the KKK has found a new quick way to hang men of color... Damn KKK. However i won't because it is nobodies place to past judement. And do you really think this guy cares what we think???? AMERICA!!

ED. NOTE: You raised the race issue, Big Ed. I took pains to note that the issue was NOT in play. Nitpick somewhere else, please. BTW, Big Ed, your comment has a few spelling errors in it. Look around for the spell-check on your browser, and turn it on, then those little red lines that appear under a word can be corrected with right-clicks.

[Sharon]

The dipshit got what he deserved! BTW........is he BLACK or yet ANOTHER thieving, illiterate illegal immigrant???? Hmmmmm............

[wasteguy]

he got boyddddddddddddddddd

shitttttttttttttttttttttttttt he got boydddddddddddddddddddddd

I don't uderstand how the body ended up on that side of the fence with the head in that direction

[Montu-sama]

I wonder if it would of been possible to jump onto the roof of the building...

[Dana]

Karma, anyone?

[Daniel Day]

He got off easy. From that height, especially onto asphalt, he would have had to be extremely lucky to ever walk again.

[Rivrdog]

The interesting report would have been written by the paramedics, for the coroner (Medical Examiner in some states). I copped for one of the few departments that recognized that a cop has to be able to medically intervene at times, so I have Level 1 paramedic training as well as police skills, and I would have loved to write up that report. The key would have been in weighing the remains and calculating the fall distance and "terminal velocity" (how's that for a physics pun?) of the body as it struck the fence.

BTW, look at the photo that shows the detail of the fence (the one with the head on it). Interesting how that fence has doubled iron or steel horizontal stringers in it's construction. That's way more strength than is usually built into a wrought-iron fence. I'm not at the location to survey the fencing need, but that fencing must have cost whovever put it in a bunch more than the usual fence. Puzzle there, but the fence only bent slightly when the hurtling doomed fellow hit it.

BTW, the reason I put the race caveat in is a reaction to events locally: Police chase + dead black guy (for whatever reason) = major scandal, rocking the local government to it's roots, around these parts (the Soviet of Portland).

[Felicity]

wow. what a lot of blood. would anyone normally have made remarks re the color of his skin? that seems rather short-sighted of said fictitious person. Because this would be so far out that it's interesting no matter what, and hey, the guy did it to himself, after all. Bet it blew the policemen's minds.