learn. Can you show her, all of us, what you know so far?”
“Sure. A lot of it you’ve probably already figured out,” Doc said. With our lack of specialists in the county, Doc tended to go beyond the normal ME duties. “We’ll have to double-check all this once I get to the lab and have my equipment. I need to put their clothes and skin under magnification, get a better look at the powder marks and wounds. But first glance, it looks like the children were shot from a short distance, maybe two or three feet away, based on visible powder residue on their clothes.”
“And their mother?” Max asked.
“At least five or six feet away,” Doc said. “Maybe more. All three were standing when they were shot.”
I’d been wrong about the little girl, Sybille, it appeared. I thought perhaps she’d been sitting. “How do you know?” I asked.
“The blood patterns. I found drops not far from each of the bodies that I think were initial impact.” Doc pulled out a pencil, held it in his gloved hand and pointed at a spot on a dried leaf just behind Benjamin that had an evidence marker next to it. “They’re round, as if the blood fell straight down.”
“All shot from behind,” I said. “The kids in their heads, and Anna Johansson in her back.”
“That’s right,” Doc said. “I think Anna may have been shot first. I think she was hanging the laundry when it happened.”
“How do you know that?” Max asked.
“Blood spatter,” Doc said, pointing at the clothes pinned onto the line. “There’s a fine mist on a few of the pieces near where she fell.”
“Were the bodies moved?” I asked, wondering about my hunch about Benjamin.
“It appears the boy was rolled over,” Doc said. “I think he was initially standing, tottered, stumbled and fell after the bullet hit him and landed on his back. I checked his neck, above his shirt, and he has mild lividity on his back, but it’s darker on the side he’s lying on.”
When the heart stops, gravity pools blood at the body’s lowest point and causes lividity, a purplish tone to the skin that resembles bruising. I thought about what Max and I had just been debating, why the killer covered the bodies. This might be more evidence that he did it out of shame. Rolling Benjamin off his back and onto his side kept the kid’s blank eyes from staring up at the killer. “I’d noticed the angle of the shot seemed off for him to have fallen in that position,” I said. “It makes sense that he initially fell on his back.”
“I’ll know more when I open them up and chart the trajectories of their wounds,” Doc said. “But, yes, I think you’re right about the boy. The woman and girl, however, I’m guessing simply fell and were left in those positions.”
“Time frame?” I asked.
“Rigor mortis has begun to set in, but it’s early in the process. I’d say this happened two to three hours ago,” he said, adjusting his wire-rimmed glasses. “From what I hear, Jacob Johansson was bleeding out pretty badly in the kitchen. That right?”
“It is,” I said. “Throat was cut but not carotids. Some blood on his shirt. A moderate pool near the neck when the EMTs arrived and started an IV.”
“That type of blood loss, it’s lucky he survived that long,” Doc said. “Anyway, looking at the condition of Anna’s body and those of the children, I believe they died early this morning. My guess is roughly about seven a.m. or so. But we’ll do a liver temp to check cooling as soon as I get them to the morgue. That should tell us more. Although none of this is precise, always an estimate.”
“Anything about the weapon?” Max asked.
“Not from the bodies, but I think the CSI folks have information for you,” Doc said. “I may find fragments during autopsy that could help, but we’re not there yet.”
“Thanks, Doc,” I said.
The old man shook his head and his lips melted into a deep frown. “Gotta be one of the saddest things I’ve ever seen, Clara, and I’ve seen a lot,” Doc said. “What the hell’s wrong with people that someone would do this?”
None of us had a good answer, so we didn’t even try to explain the tragedy surrounding us.
“When are the autopsies?” Max asked. Doc said he’d start on them that afternoon, and we thanked him and excused ourselves, then made our way over to Craig Mueller, the