Psychological

Autopsy
Dr Vasundharaa S Nair
Assistant Professor
Jindal Institute of Behavioral Sciences
OP Jindal Global University
 What is ?
Psychological autopsy (PA) refers to a postmortem
investigative procedure that seeks to uncover the intention
of the decedent through a thorough retrospective evaluation
through structured interviews of informants as well as a
perusal of relevant records (Isometsa, 2001).
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 History

Dr Theodore J Curphey Edwin Schneidmen

• Psychologist
• LA county chief medical examiner
• Co funder of LA Suicide Prevention Society
• Drug overdose issues without any reason
• Coined the term ‘ PA ‘
• 1958
• Worked with psychologists from LA Suicide
Prevention Centre
 4 goals:

Perfect storm of circumstances : Why Provide insight Arrive at a conclusion

death occured? into the as to the
circumstances manner of death that
surrounding the is consistent with the
death. evidence.
A systematic process used in a death investigation to
01 come to an educated conclusion as to the manner of the
death when the manner is in question.

When a death is due to the actions of the decedent, the

02 manner is typically either suicide
(intentional) or accidental (unintentional).

Contribute to the Refine suicide

body of research on assessment and
Majorly done at the behest of surviving families with a
suicide. prevention
03 need to understand their loved one’s death.
techniques.
Where? (Cavanagh [Link]., 2003)

01 02 03
Investigating Clarifying Police enquiry

04 05 06
Research Tool Completed Suicide Associated/
Underlying Mental
Illness
 Importance

Motive: The reason or the

Sane vs insane: In the cases
Cause: It determines whether intention behind the
of insurance related,
the person dies from persons death. This may
Mode: It determines whether Lethality: It determines the if the person committed
suicide, vehicular accident, include;
the person died due rate of risk factor suicide then the claim is null
hemorrhage in the brain Why the person committed
to accident, natural, suicidal associated with the case. It is and void. If the person dies
etc. The actual reason which suicide? What makes the
or homicidal. categorized as high, due to some accident
caused the person to person to commit the act?
medium, low, self-inflicting then the insurance can be
die Why the person choose the
claimed.
same day as on
someone’s birthday,
anniversary date etc?

Mohanty [Link]., 2021

[Link]
 With Limited information
• Only relatives are spoken to , without the police.
• Immediately post the event and then 3 month later, to
ensure lesser recall bias.

Scenarios With Extended Information

• With gathered information
Psychological Autopsy are majorly of 3 • Suicide notes and circumstantial evidence from the police
scenarios and the magistrate

With Key informant relatives

• With major family members who stayed with the person
• immediate and post 1-3 months.
• individually or together.
 Key Goals

Identify behavioral Establish presence or Determine presence or Determine suicide risk Perform a post - Establish whether the
patterns - Relation to absence of mental absence of motives factors - aggravating mortem suicide risk deceased person had a
stress, adaptability, illness - Precipitating (suicidal intent) and mitigating assessment risk of suicide or not.
habits, routine Factor
 Identifying information of All details surrounding the Brief history outline, Family history of
the victim, including name, death, including method or including medical illness, death
age, address, and other cause, if available treatment, therapy, etc.

Perfoming PA essential information

Exact procedure and steps will be

Personality description and Typical patterns of behavior Recent history of stressful Substance use, including
determined based upon the lifestyle of the victim of the victim, especially in events alcohol and drugs
circumstances of the death or suicide. response to stressful events

Victim’s interpersonal Information on dreams, Information on plans, Assessment of intention -

relationships fantasies, fears, etc. successes, upswings establishing victim’s role in
their own death

Collecting and analyzing information Any relevant changes Rating of lethality, which is Reaction of informants Any special features and
before death in terms of a scale measuring the upon finding out about the comments
• medical records, habits, hobbies, eating, and degree of lethality in a victim’s death
• psychiatric records, relationships suicide attempt
• police records,
• visuals from the crime scene
• autopsy findings

The process of performing a psychological autopsy is complex and requires a great amount of
time. (The Forensic Mental Health Practitioner, Vol. 2, Issue 1, 2019)
 Face to Face Interview
• This type of interview is done
• right in front without any interface and with proper
• consent. Family members, friends, relative, next of kin
• are interviewed very extensively to know the victim
• properly.

Investigative Health Personnel Interview

• The medical examiner,

Procedure •
•
psychologist if the victim has any history of mental illness,
all the personnel who were associated with the victim’s
• health are interviewed. The interviewee should be given
• the prior notice and the consent should be taken

The Last Contact Personnel

• the person who was
• last in contact with the victim prior to his/her death. Even
• the forensic personnel are interviewed
 Who all?
• Close relatives staying with the decesed during the
incident. Eg: spouse, friends etc.
• Close relatives who are in close contact through
telephone or video methods.
• Neighbours
• Family physician (if applicable)
• Traditional healer, priests, religious heads etc (if
applicable)
• Organisational heads and contacts
• Investigating police team
Additional (Menon et. al., 2020)

01 02 03
Medical records Suicide note, Personal book, bank
autopsy report accounts
04 05 06
Social media Phone/Email logs CCTV footage from
handles the area of the
incident
 01 02 03
Case Studies Sunanda
Pushkar
Aarushi
Talwar
Sushant
Singh Case
Fundamental questions Case Case

01 What was the case about?

04 05 06 10
Burari Death Darshan Rohit Howard
Explain PA - who called for it, was it done, Case Solanki Vamula Hughes
02 why was it done, what was the procedure
followed, what tests were done and by
Case Case
whom?

07 08 09
03 What was the outcome of the same?
Sister Anni Dewani Sangli
Abhaya Murder Case Family
Case Case
04 If you were the team incharge, how would
you plan?
Cautions (Crawley & Bell, 2007)

01 02 03
Age of the Victim Social Stigma Impact on the family
towards Suicide
04 05 06
Implications on the Lack of uniformity Validity of the
data gathering among Coroners instrument
 Understanding the Equivocal Deaths and Suicides:

• In a case of suicide -> NASH (Natural, Accidental, Suicidal, Homicidal).

• There may be the cause of suicide (victim tries to self-inflict) on the other hand it might the case of sub-intentional (victim

Application
doesn’t want to commit suicide but there exist certain instigating factor which led the victim to commit such act).
• The question lies gap between the probability of committing suicide and sub-intentional death

Understanding the Risk Factors:

• age as a risk factor, it is stated that children are considered to commit suicide because they don’t have the knowledge about the
lethality.
• sex as a risk factor, eath by suicide among males are 3 times more than females.
• Certain factors that instigate the victim are unemployment, relationship, substance abuse, painful emotions, socio-economic
status, neuroticism (poor level of emotional regulation) .

Social Media Psychological Autopsy:

• In this modern era of social media, every individual have an account in every platform (Facebook, Whatsapp, Instagram etc).
Some people are so much into social media that they share almost all their emotions in the social media platform..
• There may be also case of ‘cyber-bullying, cyber- stalking’ etc which may be the cause of the victim to commit suicide.
• It is a retrospective investigation on victim’s life and the reason that led to suicide.
• New aspects of Psychological Autopsy collaborated with the social mobile and media.
 In Summary,
“A behavioural scientific impartial investigation of the psychological (motivational, intentional) aspects of a particular death. It legitimately conducts interviews (with a variety of
people who knew the decedent) and examines personal documents (suicidal notes, diaries, and letters) and other materials (including autopsy and police reports) that are relevant to
the role in the individual’s death.

Medical history
and history of
To determine role in many legal suits,
events surrounding
the mode of death Reasons for death malpractice suits,
the death. PA
The quality of at that particular and insurance claims,
autopsy period of time including
criminal investigations.

Details of scene Criterion: to uncover

of crime an attempt to hidden secrets
reconstruct the that may help
Primary goals Psychotherapeutic personal life to give
value to the and character family members
Assessment of
survivor of the deceased, peace of mind
lethality (suicide)
Reach out to me:
[Link]@[Link]
Twitter: @SVasundharaa
LinkedIn: Dr. Vasundharaa Santhosh Nair