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Abstract: 

The primary authors, Gael Strack and Casey Gwinn, assisted by a group of medical professionals--Dr. Dean Hawley, Dr. William Green, Dr. Bill Smock, and Dr. Ralph Riviello--delineate the tragic medical sequalae that often accompany strangulation, even many years later. They begin their discussion with the heartbreaking case of a 52-year-old woman who, 30-plus years after enduring strangulation as a teenager, at the hands of a boyfriend, was experiencing serious negative impacts on her health, including brain bleeds, as a result of those long-ago assaults. Her plaintive comment that “he is going to kill me thirty years after he abused me!” was met by the only response that author Casey Gwinn, who was assisting this woman, could summon: “We didn’t know 30 years ago. I am so sorry.” Here, the serious health implications of strangulation are examined: the fact that victims are often strangled more than once, that severe negative impacts on health may be incurred, even in the absence of visible symptoms, that death may result days, weeks, or even (as noted in the case above) decades later, and that the mental health implications are often profound. Strangulation has been compared to water-boarding, which is an (almost) universally recognized as a form of torture. Given the other medical findings about strangulation summarized here, the authors emphasize that, “They (victims) have the right to know!”

Keywords: Short- and Long-term Medical Effects of Non-Lethal Strangulation

Affiliations:  1: Indiana University School of Medicine; 2: California Clinical Forensic Medical Training Center; 3: Louisville Metro Police Department; 4: Drexel University College of Medicine; 5: Alliance for HOPE International.