Injury ‘points to strangulation’

A PATHOLOGY expert told the reopened inquest into the death of Pietermaritzburg-born dentist Dr Hoosen Haffejee that there were at least three to five other more likely, more accessible positions of suspension had he wanted to hang himself.

In his testimony before the Pietermaritzburg High Court, forensic pathologist Dr Steve Naidoo said that the cause of death was the consequence of pressure upon the neck and should be considered the consequence of a neck constriction rather than actual hanging by suspension, as suggested by State pathologist Professor Isodore Gordon in the first inquest into Haffejee’s death conducted in 1978.

Naidoo said that Gordon had repeatedly held to his view that Haffejee death was consistent with hanging, but despite this it was not his place to make a finding whether Haffejee’s death was homicidal, suicidal or accidental.

“I think this needs to be clarified because clearly this was not a case of hanging. Hanging is usually where the body is suspended and the neck is constricted by the body’s weight pulling against the ligature suspended from a higher position and that is the body weight factor.

“In this case it was not the body’s weight at all, and looking at my own observations, the only possible traction on that ligature was the tilt of the head because most of the body was supported – perhaps 80 to 90% of the body was supported,” Naidoo said.

He further stated that it was clear from the nature of the twist of the ligature that Haffejee’s death was a ligature strangulation, although this did not imply that doctors were making a finding of whether the death was homicidal or suicidal, saying that this would be a determination that the scene examination would suggest to the court.

“It’s clear that the ligature was extremely tight, it was said so in Professor Gordon’s scene observation and in his oral testimony, ‘extremely tight’, that’s the word that was used. So this is not a hanging, this was a strangulation by ligature.”

When quizzed by advocate Howard Varney, a member of the Haffejee family’s legal team, on whether it would have been considerably easy for Haffejee to have stood up against the grille door, in a standing position, and turned around until the ligature tight enough, Moodley responded affirmatively.

“It’s an extremely unusual form of a ligature contraction. I have seen one other unusual form that I don’t think was really resolved where there’s a question whether it was self-induced or an autoerotic, sexual type of death.

“But this as a hanging in a cell, certainly not autoerotic or anything like that, this was extremely unusual and having visited the cell and seen other cells too, there were at least three, or four or five other more likely, more accessible positions of suspension should the deceased had wanted to hang himself.”

Naidoo said that he agreed with the testimony of Dr David Hobson Biggs, who was commissioned by the Haffejee family to carry out a private pathology, that Haffejee’s death was not consistent with suicide and it was suffocation, and not sudden arterial occlusion.