Foreign object ingestion in complex suicide: a case report and review of the literature

Abstract

Foreign body ingestion frequently occurs accidentally in the paediatric population as well as intentionally in prisoners to achieve hospitalisation, but is relatively uncommon in forensic cases and extremely rare as a method of inducing death in complex suicide. The reasons for this infrequency are many, not least the slowness of action and the lack of effectiveness in terms of lethality, regardless of the object used. In this article, we show an unplanned complex suicide carried out by ingestion of four plastic knives before hanging. Other complex suicides involving foreign body ingestion reported in the forensic literature are reviewed.