Have you checked your hyoid lately? Strangulation, pathology, trauma, accident

Abstract

Fractures of the human hyoid bone encountered in forensic anthropology cases involving apparent homicide victims have been interpreted as markers of strangulation. Caution is required in this assessment since modifications of the hyoid bone, cervical vertebrae, and cartilage of the trachea, thyroid and larynx may be the results of arrested ontogenetic development, hard-force trauma, autopsy mishandling and pathology. Some ten agents involving compression of circulatory vessels conducting blood to and from the brain are reviewed in this study which concludes with an account of a case investigated by the author where a homicide victim, a young Afro-American female living in Syracuse, New York, had a damaged hyoid bone. However, she had not been strangled by her aggressor; he killed her by pushing her living body against a wall. Only by examining all of the preserved osseous and cartilaginous structures of the neck may the forensic anthropologist achieve an accurate reconstruction of the manner of death associated with hyoid bone fractures.