Homicidal hanging

Abstract

Homicide by hanging is an extremely rare incident [1]. Very few cases have been reported in which a person is rendered senseless and then hanged to simulate suicidal death; though there are a lot of cases in wherein a homicide victim has been hung later. We report a case of homicidal hanging of a young Sikh individual found hanging in a well. It became evident from the results of forensic autopsy that the victim had first been given alcohol mixed with pesticides and then hanged by his turban from a well. The rare combination of lynching (homicidal hanging) and use of organo-phosporous pesticide poisoning as a means of homicide are discussed in this paper.