Head injury with traumatic and postural asphyxia: a case report

An autopsy was performed on a 22-year-old tractor driver who was found on a cliff, 20 feet down from the highway, trapped between the wheel of a tractor trolley and some stones in an inverted position, after sustaining a head injury. Post mortem lividity was present above the knee joints except where the left arm was firmly adducted on the chest and where the cloth folds were compressing on the chest and abdomen all round. Sub-mucosal ecchymoses and petechial hemorrhages were present in the pharyngeal walls, and on both surfaces of the epiglottis and larynx above the vestibular folds. Such hemorrhages were first noticed along with other findings of traumatic and postural asphyxia.