by Hugh Sprunt*
Last Revised 3/28/99

Autopsy Report: The First Entrance Wound Was In The "Posterior Oropharynx"

Recent work indicates that the Foster autopsy report (186 KB) may well be inconsistent on its face. Rob Bracci's analysis of the autopsy report in late 1998, begun after Bracci, a 28 year-old from Michigan, obtained a video of a "Foster View-graph" presentation of mine that had been taped by a Los Angeles area forum, formally questioned the internal consistency of the wound track information provided by the autopsy report. The autopsy doctor's report (186 KB) stated that the first entrance wound made by the bullet was in Foster's

posterior oropharynx at a point 7.5" from the top of he head; there is also a defect in the tissues of the soft palate and some of these fragments contain probably powder debris. The wound track in the head continues backward and upward with an entrance wound just left of the foramen magnum with tissue damage to the brain stem and left cerebral hemisphere with an irregular exit scalp wound and skull defect near the midline in the occipital region.

The "Body Diagram - Head" in the autopsy report depicts a 1" by 1.25" section of skull in the upper rear center of Foster's head at a point 3" below the crown of the head that allegedly was removed by the bullet fired from the Army Colt .38 revolver that we are told Foster placed in his mouth at Fort Marcy Park.

As can be seen from that diagram, all of the portion of the skull allegedly removed by the exit of the bullet lies above a line joining the tops of Foster's ears. No one, layman or medical professional, would describe this trauma as a neck wound.

According to medical dictionaries and anatomical charts, the upper limit of the oropharynx is defined by the level of the soft palate ("The oropharynx reaches from the soft palate to the upper border of the epiglottis," says one medical dictionary). The uvula is the name of the lowermost component of the soft palate. This is the soft tissue that you see in the mirror, hanging down into your throat from above and behind the tongue.

In layman's terms, the "posterior oropharynx" is the back of the throat, behind and somewhat below the top surface of the tongue, visible in your mirror starting just below the lower tip of your uvula and extending downward. The oropharynx is the space bounded anteriorly and superiorly by the uvula/soft palate and "is level with the second cervical vertebra body and upper part of the third," according to another medical reference work.

The oropharynx is thus slightly below and forward of the atlas, the uppermost cervical vertebra, which is just below the base of the skull and connected with it. The nasopharynx adjoins and is immediately above the oropharynx according to medical dictionaries and anatomical charts ("The soft palate separates the nasopharynx from the oropharynx. . .").

Not Just A Matter Of Medical Terminology

The autopsy doctor's multiple use of the term "posterior oropharynx" in his report is not the only evidence therein that this is the location of an entrance wound. The doctor's multiple use of a distance measurement also points to the posterior oropharynx.

Analysis of actual human skulls shows that the reported 7.5" distance from the top of Foster's head to the entrance wound in the posterior oropharynx referred to in the autopsy report does indeed equal the vertical distance between the top of the head to roughly the middle of the oropharynx on a head the size of Foster's. Therefore, this 7.5" measurement tends to confirm that the autopsy doctor intended to report that the first entrance wound indeed was in the posterior oropharynx.

The autopsy doctor also refers to a "defect [not an "entrance wound"] in the tissues of the soft palate," indicating that the soft palate had been damaged by the passage of the bullet ("some of these fragments [of the soft palate] contain probable powder debris," the autopsy doctor wrote). Did this language mean that the soft palate was actually perforated by the bullet or could the "defect" [damage] have another source (such as fragmentation of, or injury to, the soft palate from gun gases expelled from the barrel)? For whatever reason, the autopsy doctor did not indicate an "entrance wound" in, or a perforation of, the soft palate.

Close Enough For Government Work?

Those who examined this aspect of the autopsy report (186 KB) prior to Rob Bracci missed or misunderstood the potential significance of the doctor's location of the first entrance wound at the posterior oropharynx (as opposed to in the "posterior nasopharynx" - the back wall of the throat just above the oropharynx).

They placed more weight on the reported defect in the soft palate than on the reported entrance wound in the posterior oropharynx and similar language in the report of the four doctors who reviewed the autopsy that indicated the bullet's rearward trajectory was upward and not (as would be the case for an entrance wound in the posterior oropharynx) horizontal or slightly downward.

Thus, they assumed that the path of the bullet when it left the barrel could actually have been "backward and upward" [emphasis added], as also stated by the autopsy doctor, rather than the "backward" or "backward and downward" direction implied by the autopsy doctor's location of the first "entrance wound" in the posterior oropharynx, at least if one is permitted to assume that when the autopsy doctor wrote "oropharynx" he really meant "oropharynx" and not "nasopharynx."

[Note that the autopsy doctor did not refer to the first entrance wound as being in the posterior nasopharynx, which would have been consistent with the bullet having first struck the "soft palate" somewhere at or above the tip of the uvula.]

The autopsy report (186 KB) became public with the release of the Fiske report on the Foster death on June 30, 1994.

Change's Made By Fiske's Panel Of Reviewing Doctors

Early analysts of the autopsy report (186 KB) also turned to the included language from the report of the four doctors who reviewed medical aspects of the Foster death on behalf of Regulatory Independent Counsel Fiske. According to these doctors:

The bullet perforated the soft palate [sic], entered the cranial cavity directly to the left of the foramen magnum, contused the left side of the brainstem, grazed the medial aspect of the left cerebral hemisphere and exited through the occipital skull and scalp.

This language is consistent with that of the autopsy report except in two potentially significant aspects.

First, although the autopsy doctor stated that the first entrance wound (presumably an important location to identify in a gunshot autopsy) was in the "posterior oropharynx at a point 7.5" from the top of he head," the reviewing doctors' report did not mention the initial entrance wound in the posterior oropharynx. Indeed, the reviewing doctors omitted any reference to the posterior oropharynx as being part of the wound track!

Second, the reviewing doctors reported the first entrance wound as having been in the soft palate, not the posterior oropharynx ("the bullet perforated the soft palate" - the "defect" language of the autopsy doctor has vanished and been replaced with the word "perforated").

Unless these differences in medical terminology are semantically insignificant, the autopsy doctor's placement of the entrance wound in the posterior oropharynx is significant because it is not consistent with the reported location of the exit wound, unless the bullet was deflected after it made its entrance in the posterior oropharynx. However, if there were such a deflection, it would have left physical evidence and no such evidence was reported.

The path of a bullet in an intra-oral gunshot which first perforates the posterior oropharynx would have to change direction significantly upward to follow the remaining wound track described by both the autopsy report and the report of the four Fiske reviewing doctors (ending by the bullet exiting the center rear of the skull in the classic "eat-your-gun" location, 3" below the top of the head at the level of the external occipital protuberance).

Were this hypothetical deflection to have been caused by contact with the front surface of one of the bones of the upper cervical vertebrae (the bones directly behind the posterior oropharynx and the only bones in the vicinity), the upward deflection required would have been about 40°, a sizable change in direction for a soft nosed high-velocity bullet fired from an Army Colt .38 Special revolver. Obviously, if the deflection were caused by anything lying behind the front surface of the cervical vertebrae, the deflection angle would have had to have been even greater.

There is no mention in the autopsy report (186 KB) or by the reviewing doctors of the bullet having been deflected, by the cervical vertebra or otherwise, even though the posterior oropharynx is not in line with the balance of the wound track described by either the autopsy or reviewing doctors.

If there had been no material deflection of a bullet making an entrance wound in Foster's posterior oropharynx (7.5" inches directly below the top of his head), it would have followed a horizontal, or perhaps slightly downward, trajectory and exited the center posterior of Foster's neck at or about the level of the second or third cervical vertebra.

Another Incremental Change Is Introduced By The Senate Committee Report

The Senate committee report on the Foster death (S. Rept. 103-433, Vol. 1, January 3, 1995) "improved" on the language of the four Fiske reviewing doctors who shifted the location of the first entrance wound from the "posterior oropharynx" of the autopsy report to the soft palate ("The bullet perforated the soft palate . . ") by stating on page 4 that ". . . Mr. Foster died in Fort Marcy Park from a self-inflicted gun shot wound to the upper [sic] palate of his mouth."

"Upper palate?" Since the authors of the Senate report presumably do not mean "hard palate" by their reference to the "upper palate" (no one has even intimated officially that the bullet perforated the hard palate, located on the roof of the mouth forward of the soft palate), what can they mean by their phrase "upper palate of his mouth"?

I believe it is reasonable to infer that the authors of the Senate report mean the "upper potion of the soft palate of his mouth" by "upper palate of his mouth." If so, they are continuing the "upward" progression of the location of the entrance wound begun by the Fiske reviewing doctors, from "posterior oropharynx" (autopsy report) to the "soft palate" (the reviewing doctors), to "upper palate" (authors of the Senate report).

Presumably, the purpose of this progressive change in the location of the first entrance wound is to make its official location more "palatable" with the balance of the wound track (which terminated, according to the autopsy report, with an exit wound in the upper center rear of Foster's skull, three inches below the crown of his head in the immediate vicinity of the occipital protuberance).

The Exit Wound Observed At The Funeral Home

Even before the discovery of the Medical Examiner's field report in the National Archives on July 19, 1997, with its altered language on page one ("MOUTH - [????] HEAD") and the unaltered language on page two ("mouth to neck"), there was evidence outside the official record that supported the existence of an exit wound in the center rear of Foster's neck at about the level of the second cervical vertebra.

A long-time friend of Foster's was interviewed on tape by Accuracy In Media relatively soon after the death. This witness told Accuracy In Media (and others) that, when Foster's body was in the Little Rock funeral home, the proprietor had allowed him to view the body and had called his attention to a dime-sized wound in the back of Foster's neck at the hairline. However, the autopsy report indicates no trauma whatsoever to the neck (see the attached "Gunshot Wound Chart").

[See a recounting of this interview and of Rob Bracci's analysis written by Reed Irvine for the January-A 1999 "AIM Report"]

Other Evidence Of A Neck Wound

The lack of an actual exit wound in the upper center rear of Foster's skull notwithstanding the autopsy report, is of course also supported by the paramedic in the park that night who reported that he saw no exit wound in the head when he bagged Foster's body (this paramedic also chose to code the death a "homicide," not a suicide, when he left the park that night with the body almost three hours after it had been discovered).

The FBI telex (180 KB) reporting "no exit wound" certainly is inconsistent with the autopsy report's description and illustration of a 1" by 1.25" portion of skull that had been blown out of Foster's head some 3" from the top of his head. The telex is, of course, also inconsistent with the existence of a dime-sized exit wound in the hairline of the rear of the neck, although this wound would of course, have been less conspicuous. Perhaps this inconsistency can be reconciled along the lines below.

The Family Reported Foster Knew Proper Intra-Oral Gunshot Technique

An exit wound in the back of the neck from an intra-oral shot is less indicative of suicide than an exit wound in the upper rear of the head. While both shots can result in death, a shot aimed to exit out the back of the neck is significantly more likely to leave the victim alive. Most people who commit suicide via intra-oral gunshot, after putting the barrel of the gun in the mouth, point it toward the rear and angle the barrel upward, aiming for the upper posterior of the brain (consistent with the exit wound depicted by the autopsy doctor).

The accuracy required for such a shot to be fatal is much less than that of an intra-oral shot that is not angled upward, but instead aimed to travel horizontally and sever the upper end of the spinal cord. As we have learned in recent years, those with severely damaged upper spinal cords, can live as quadriplegics, many of them able to breathe without assistance. Presumably a person planning to kill himself via an intra-oral gunshot would, at all costs, want to avoid such a result by aiming upward for the brain.

But what about Mr. Foster? He was not known as a "gun person," so maybe he had no clear understanding how to kill himself via a gun shot to the mouth.

According to statements made under oath by the lead US Park Police Investigator at the body site in Fort Marcy Park who drove to the Foster home with his superior that night and personally notified Lisa Foster that her husband was dead, she responded "did he put it in his mouth?" very shortly after being told of the "apparent" gun shot suicide.

The Park Police Investigator reported that he found Lisa Foster's question "odd," but subsequent information may shed some light on the reasons for her remark.

A September 11, 1995, article in The New Yorker by Peter Boyer, reported that Lisa at first thought, "I didn't know that he knew how to kill himself." The article goes on to tell us, however, that Lisa Foster, soon learned otherwise: "But the children reminded me that he [Foster] had just watched 'A Few Good Men,' and that is how the guy in the movie did it - he shot himself in the mouth."

If the family's opinion is correct and Foster "knew how to kill himself" by watching how the Executive Officer of the Marine unit at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, killed himself by a shot into the mouth in the movie "A Few Good Men," he would certainly have realized that one does not put the gun barrel in one's mouth and aim for the back of the neck. No - one places the gun barrel in the mouth and angles it appreciably (if not almost vertically) upward so that the bullet will blow out the upper rear center of the skull.

The Evolution Of The Official Position On The Gunshot?

Was the actual location of Foster's exit wound (in the back of the neck at the hairline) changed (to the upper center rear of the head, 3" below the crown) so that it would correspond to the expected location of the exit wound in a classic intra-oral gunshot suicide?

Was the first official position that there was no exit wound? If so, was this position chosen because the exit wound in the back of the neck was in the "wrong place" for an intra-oral gunshot suicide and thus would materially undercut the official conclusion of suicide? This position would account for the FBI being told (or deciding) that there was "no exit wound" and reporting that to the Director's office in the telex described above.

Was the second official position, that there was an exit wound in the upper rear center of the skull, initially frustrated because the bullet from the actual fatal shot (the small entrance wound seen by Paramedic Richard Arthur under the inside of the right jawline) had come to rest inside the upper rear skull, producing the skull fractures in that area depicted by the autopsy report, and that bullet had appeared on the autopsy X-rays and therefore would have been discovered to be totally inconsistent with the size and weight of a bullet fired by the official death weapon (the Army Colt Special firing high velocity .38 ammunition)?

This hypothesis would explain why the report written by the senior of the four US Park Police employees who attended the autopsy on July 21 could accurately state that the autopsy doctor told the Park Police in attendance that "X-rays indicated that there was no evidence of bullet fragments in the head" (the .22, or other small caliber bullet, lodged just inside the top of the skull, would not match a round fired by the official death weapon, so any evidence of the small caliber round, such as the X-rays, had to "disappear" if the eventual official position documented in the autopsy report was to be sustained).

Although obviously speculative, this hypothesis also serves to explain why the autopsy doctor indicated in his autopsy forms completed during the autopsy that he had taken X-rays (186 KB). He said this to support his contemporaneous claim to the Park Police that there was no bullet in the head, even though there was a bullet in the head, a bullet that was inconsistent with a bullet fired by the official death weapon. The "X-rays taken" check-mark made on July 21 at the autopsy (186 KB) would contradict the autopsy doctor's later statements under oath that he took no X-rays (and, under this hypothesis, should have been removed from the "Gun Shot Wound Chart," one of the five pages prepared on July 21 at the autopsy itself that later were combined with the first two pages in the seven-page autopsy report that were typed up after July 21).

Of course, later the doctor testified that he had not taken X-rays so he could avoid having to produce them. [Although he said the X-ray machine was not working at the time of Foster's death, Reed Irvine of Accuracy in Media documented that the first service call on this two-month old machine did not occur until three months after the death.]

When confronted with the report by the attending US Park Police officers stating that the doctor told them the results of the X-rays, the autopsy doctor had no explanation except to repeat that he took no X-rays. This bizarre "X-ray" incident is described in more detail below.

This hypothesis would also explain why the autopsy doctor, as noted in the US Park Police report, violated normal procedure and began the autopsy prior to the arrival of the attending police officers by removing the tongue and soft palate (if the small caliber shot that Paramedic Arthur claimed produced an entrance wound just inside the right jawline existed, it would likely have perforated not only the soft palate but also the tongue).

If they had seen a bullet hole in the tongue, the police officers who observed the autopsy, though obviously not medical specialists, might have wondered how a man who supposedly killed himself by placing a gun barrel in his mouth and blowing out the upper center rear of his head managed, with the same shot, to blow a hole in his tongue.

They likely would have put that observation of a bullet hole in the tongue (just as they included the doctor's statement regarding the X-ray results) in their own report, thereby further undermining the suicide finding. Thus, it was necessary to conceal the bullet hole in the tongue from the police by removing the soft palate and tongue prior to their arrival. The "pre-autopsy" is also described in more detail below.

If "shenanigans" like those described above accompanied the autopsy, that might explain in part why the autopsy doctor, despite a direct request from the police officers present, refused to give them the name of his diener (autopsy assistant) for their report.

To his credit, Mr. Starr's report on the Foster death (page 30) quotes the autopsy report accurately regarding the entrance wound being in the "posterior oropharynx at a point approximately 7 ½" from the top of the head" (As Reed Irvine of AIM has pointed out, Starr's own reviewing doctor, Dr. Brian Blackbourne may have objected to the language of the Fiske reviewing doctors that omitted any reference to the entrance wound in the posterior oropharynx and instead placed the first entrance wound in the soft palate).

Starr's report also cites a non-public OIC interview with Dr. Beyer in which he confirms that the first entrance wound was in the posterior oropharynx. In this interview, Beyer also states that there was "good alignment" between the entrance and exit wounds something that is difficult to understand given Dr. Beyer reported the entrance wound was about 7 ½" inches below the crown of the head (even allowing a ¼" inch or so for the thickness of the hair and scalp) - a location consistent on Foster's skull with the approximate middle of the vertical extent of the oropharynx (not the very top of the oropharynx at the tip of the uvula where the nasopharynx begins).

Medical Terms & Keyed Notes
Annotating The Associated Anatomical Diagram,
Re: Vincent W. Foster Autopsy Data

© Hugh Sprunt, March 1999; All Rights Reserved

[Vox: (972) 484-7136; Email: HSprunt@aol.com]

Definitions Used

Source: Webster's Medical Desk Dictionary (Merriam-Webster, 1986; 790 pages)

Pharynx: The part of the alimentary canal situated between the cavity of the mouth and the esophagus and in man being a musculomembranous tube about four and a half inches long that is continuous above with the mouth and nasal passages, communicates through the eustachian tubes with the ears, and extends downward past the opening into the larynx to the lower border of the cricoid cartilage where it is continuous with the esophagus.

Posterior: Situated behind: as a: situated at or toward the hinder end of the body : Caudal. b: Dorsal – used of human anatomy in which the upright posture makes dorsal and caudal identical.

Nasopharynx: The upper part of the pharynx continuous with the nasal passages. [Separately, a medical text states, "The nasopharynx lies superior to the soft palate and opens into each nasal cavity through the right and left posterior nasal apertures."]

Oropharynx: The part of the pharynx that is below the soft palate and above the epiglottis and is continuous with the mouth. [A medical text: "The oropharynx is situated inferior to the soft palate and posterior to the root of the tongue. . . The oropharynx reaches from the soft palate to the upper border of the epiglottis. . . Posteriorly, it is level with the second cervical vertebral body and the upper part of the third."]

Laryngopharynx: The lower part of the pharynx lying behind or adjacent to the larynx.

Soft Palate: The membranous and muscular fold suspended from the posterior margin of the hard palate and partially separating the mouth cavity from the pharynx.

Hard Palate: The bony anterior part of the palate forming the roof of the mouth.

Uvula: The pendent fleshy lobe in the middle of the posterior border of the soft palate.

Defect: A lack or deficiency of something necessary for adequacy in form or function <a hearing defect >.

Numbered Points on the Anatomical Diagram

[In an effort to communicate clearly and unambiguously and to avoid misunderstanding, the keyed notes below were intentionally written in a somewhat redundant manner.]

Point 1 This point is the location of the first "entrance wound" per the Foster autopsy report and was located on the anatomical diagram in three corroborating ways.

First, the autopsy doctor reported that the first "entrance wound" was located in the "posterior oropharynx," which is where Point 1 is located (in the middle of the vertical range of the posterior oropharynx).

Second, the autopsy doctor also reported that the first "entrance wound" was located 7.5" vertically downward from the crown of Foster's head, which distance lies only 2.5 mm vertically below Point 1 (scaled to the size of the hard copy of the anatomical diagram).

According to my calculations, the original color anatomical diagram represents a head whose linear dimensions are ~50% - the actual percent came out to be 50.4% - of the linear dimensions of Foster's head; the 2.5 mm distance on the diagram is therefore the equivalent of about one-fifth inch on Foster’s head.

Third, I measured the location of Point 1 (a 7.5" vertical drop from the top of Foster's head) on an actual human skull that I borrowed from a doctor friend (the measurements on this skull being properly scaled to Foster's head and allowing about one fifth inch when measuring downward on the borrowed skull for the lack of hair and scalp on the borrowed skull – about one fourth inch on Foster's head – that was, of course present when the autopsy doctor made his measurement).

I not only ended up with a point located in the posterior oropharynx, but a point almost in the middle of the vertical range of the oropharynx (actually, 2.5 mm below the midpoint at the scale of the anatomical diagram).

To be conservative, Point 1 is located in the exact middle of the vertical range of the oropharynx (as nearly as I could measure it) rather than at the location, 2.5 mm below, of my "best estimate" based on the "7.5 inch" measurement by the autopsy doctor.

The line (I used a small bamboo skewer) joining the opening between the upper and lower two front (closed) teeth pairs on the skull and the point 7.5" (scaled to the size of my borrowed skull which was a fraction of a percent more than 80% of the linear dimensions of Foster's head) vertically below the crown of Foster's head dropped very slightly – a sixth of an inch or so, about 4 mm – from the opening between the teeth to the 7.5" point (6.0" on the borrowed skull; 7.5" X 0.80 = 6.0").

This result (the slight downward tilt from front to back) would have been some justification for placing Point (1) on the diagram about a fifth inch lower on Foster's posterior oropharynx (a tenth of an inch on the diagram itself or about 2.5 mm), but I did not do so because I wanted to be conservative – even though the autopsy doctor's 7.5" measurement would (and did) produce a point that low, I didn't push it, in part because his phrase "posterior oropharynx" was not qualified by an adjective like "upper" or "lower" or "middle."

The distance between Point 1 and Point 8 on Foster's head is 7.5". Strict calculation (50.4% X 7.5") would make this distance ~3.8" on my hard copy of the diagram. The actual distance on my hard copy of the diagram is 3.7" – again, part of my effort to locate Point 1 in a "conservative" manner (one-tenth in on the diagram being 2.5 mm).

That is, Point 1 is located in the posterior oropharynx on my copy of the anatomical diagram about 2.5 mm higher than it should be. As indicated, I thought this was the conservative approach and I saw a benefit in being able to say that Point 1 was located at the midpoint of the vertical range of the oropharynx (based on the definition I use which is given above).

Point 2 This point is located on a horizontal line passing through Point 1. Since Point 1 is ~7.5" (on Foster's head) vertically below the top of Foster's head, that means that Point 2 is also ~7.5" below the top of Foster's head. This places it on the neck in the position shown.

Although the cervical vertebra and the Atlas are not shown on this diagram, I believe that this location corresponds to a point on the neck just to the rear of the second cervical vertebra and the upper part of the third (see the definition of oropharynx above).

Note: while the position of Point 1 is "fixed" on the diagram (See above), Point 2's location is an estimate based on the assumption that the bullet that left the barrel and produced the first "entrance wound" (autopsy doctor's language) in the "posterior oropharynx" was traveling horizontally.

Thus, Point 2 could be somewhat higher or lower than shown. It would, of course, be about one-tenth of an inch lower – on the anatomical diagram – if a horizontal line were drawn through the location of my measured "best estimate" for the entrance wound (2.5 mm on the diagram below Point 1).

However, as I think can be seen from the diagram as amplified by these notes, Point 2 and Point 3 (which are the "same" point officially – namely at the Point 3 location) are, relatively speaking, a long way apart on Foster’s head.

Presumably, though, if the observation made at the funeral home is correct (see my piece "Gross Anatomy"), the location of Point 2 on the neck should correspond to the base of the hairline on Foster's head and, should be in the "neck" as shown (as opposed to the "head"), that is, if you give credence to the language in the Narrative Summary of the Medical Examiner's field report from his examination of body at Fort Marcy Park the evening of the death since the (unaltered) Narrative Summary states that the wound was "mouth to neck" not "mouth to head."

Point 3 This is the location of the exit wound specified by the autopsy doctor in that it is 3.0" below the top of Foster's head.

This converts to a distance of 1.51 inches on my hard copy of the autopsy diagram 3.0 X 50.4%) as shown (Line 3-9). Presumably, this is the distance to roughly the center of what the autopsy doctor described as a 1" by 1.25" exit wound.

Point 4 As a cross-check on the location of Point 3, I measured the distance from the top of Foster's head on the autopsy diagram to a horizontal line joining the tops of the ears of the figures on the autopsy diagram (Body Diagram - Head).

As you can see from the autopsy diagram, the exit wound lies just above a horizontal line joining the tops of the ears. If the anatomical diagram on which I placed my lines and points is consistent with the Body Diagram - Head of the autopsy report, then the equivalent point on the anatomical diagram should fall slightly below the center of the exit wound on the anatomical diagram.

I "scaled" the two heads (the anatomical diagram with my lines and points and the Body Diagram - Head in the autopsy report) so that I could plot the equivalent point on the anatomical diagram. As you can see, it falls just below Point 3 (as it should). This makes me more confident that the location of Point 3 on the anatomical diagram is correct.

Point 5 This point was determined in the following manner. I measured the distance on my own head (using a compass and being careful with the point) from the midpoint at the base of my nostrils to the top of my upper lip (mouth closed). I made the equivalent measurement on the anatomical diagram.

I then measured the distance between the same two points on my head, but with my jaw as wide as I could open it by straining. I then solved for the length of he equivalent distance (jaw wide open) for the head in the anatomical diagram and got Point 10.

The reason I did this is that some folks have said, hey, you will get good line-up with the line of the gun barrel, the posterior oropharynx, the rest of the official wound track and the location of the official 1" by 1.25" exit wound on the back of the head if Foster's mouth had been as wide open as possible and the gun laid flat against the lower jaw and tongue and fired at this upward angle.

We do not, however, get good alignment when we look at Line 10-3. This is because Point 5 lies along Line 10-3 and Point 5 is located in the posterior nasopharynx, not the posterior oropharynx as the autopsy doctor stated. This distance between Points 1 and 5 on a head the size of Foster's is 0.9" and Point 5 is materially above the border (using the definitions above) between the oropharynx and the nasopharynx.

Even if we believe that the autopsy doctor "really meant" nasopharynx when he wrote/typed "oropharynx" (twice) and that when he wrote/typed 7.5" (twice) he "really meant," say, 6.0", the location of Point 5 does not square with what he wrote. However, we need to account for the vertical extent of the barrel of the gun, which brings us to Point 6.

Point 6 This point well up on the posterior wall of the nasopharynx was located by allowing (in the vicinity of the uvula of the soft palate – the end of the barrel must have been somewhere near that location officially) for the effect of the diameter of the barrel of the official death weapon, an Army Colt Special .38 Revolver with a 4" long barrel.

That is, Line 7-6-3 is the "same" as Line 10-5-3 (jaw in each case as wide open as possible) but making an allowance for the diameter of the gun barrel at the assumed point for the end of the gun barrel (roughly 3.5" of the 4" gun barrel in the mouth) which takes us (for the purposes of this demonstration only) to the vicinity of the uvula. Lines 10-5-3 and 7-6-3 are not parallel only because I thought it appropriate to allow for the diameter of the gun barrel in the mouth at the end of the gun barrel.

The result, if we are assuming that Foster's mouth is as open as can be and the gun is laid along the tongue and if we allow for the diameter of the gun barrel, Line 7-6-3, like Line 10-5-3 (only more so) does not "line-up" in two senses:

A) The first "entrance wound" in each case is not in the "posterior oropharynx" as the autopsy doctor wrote; instead it is well into (especially when we allow for the barrel diameter) the nasopharynx, and

B) the measured distance from the top of the head is not the 7.5" given us by the autopsy doctor, but 6.4" in the case of Point 5 and 5.9-6.0" for the more realistically located (allowance for gun barrel diameter) Point 6.

Point 7 See the description of the location of Point 6 which explains the location of Point 7 on the anatomical diagram.

Point 8 This is the location of the "top" or "crown" of Foster's head for the purposes of measuring the 7.5" vertical drop on Foster's head as written by the autopsy doctor. Although perhaps it is not clear on the anatomical diagram (it shows up on my color copy, but not on a black and white photocopy of my color copy), it appears to me that the anatomical diagram (unlike my borrowed skull where I did decrease the 7.5" measurement to allow for the thickness of Foster's scalp and hair; see above) shows some thickness above the upper bone of the skull for scalp/hair (just as it shows the flesh of the lips, etc.).

So, when measuring the 7.5" drop in the report of the autopsy doctor for purposes of putting Point 1 on the anatomical diagram, I did not decrease the 7.5" measurement for the thickness of hair and scalp (though, of course, I did "scale" the distance onto my hard copy of the anatomical diagram by the 50.4% factor discussed above).

Point 9 Same "altitude" as Point 8, but drawn vertically over the rear of the head of the anatomical diagram to allow the 3.0" vertical drop to the 1" by 1.25" exit wound described by the autopsy doctor.

Point 10 The location of the top of the upper lip of the anatomical diagram if the anatomical diagram's jaw is opened as much as possible. See above under the discussion of Point 5 for how this point was located on the anatomical diagram.

Summary

In closing these Keyed Notes, we finally reach the "buried lead." Line 1-4 shows the trajectory of the bullet (that is, no additional adjustment needed for the diameter of the gun barrel) using the location the autopsy doctor described for the first "entrance wound" ("posterior oropharynx, 7.5" below the top of Foster's head) and the "exit wound" (3.0" vertical drop from the top of Foster's head along the vertical mid-line of the head).

Assuming the bullet was not deflected materially between the time it was fired and the time it exited the skull (and there is no indication in the autopsy report that the wound track had to be "bent," by bullet deflection or otherwise, in order for the "good alignment" to exist, as the autopsy doctor described the alignment to the Starr OIC) the line of the barrel of the gun would have had to have been along Line 1-3.

The problem? There are at least two.

As you can tell from the discussion of the locations of Line 10-5-3 and Line 7-6-3, the barrel of the gun must have laid along the "southwestern" extension of Line 1-4.

However, as we have seen above, Foster's jaw (whether he opened it or someone opened it for him after he was dead) could not have been physically open enough to accommodate the Line 1-3 trajectory for the bullet without dislocating his jaw well before the jaw was sufficiently opened.

Furthermore, the line that connects Point 1 and Point 3 does not even show the gun barrel as being inside Foster's mouth when the shot was fired

It is my hypothesis that the autopsy report is internally inconsistent at least to this extent (that is, there may be other internal inconsistencies as well).

As I have said in other places, this particular inconsistency, to my mind, would be reconciled (would vanish) provided you believe that when the autopsy doctor wrote/typed (twice) "posterior oropharynx" he really meant to write/type (twice) "posterior nasopharynx" AND when he wrote/typed (twice) "7.5 inches," he really meant to write/type (twice) "6.0 inches."

In particular, those who believe that Line 7-6-3 approximates the wound track that the autopsy doctor really meant to describe (namely those who ignore the fact that he placed the first "entrance wound" in the "posterior oropharynx" and focus on the "defect" that he, in effect, said fragmented some of the soft palate – referring, I believe, to the portion of the soft palate that is the uvula) must ask themselves why Point 6 is in the posterior nasopharynx and ask themselves why the autopsy doctor wrote 7.5" when he meant to write 6.0".

I am not prepared at this point to make that concession, especially in light of related points mentioned in my piece, "Gross Anatomy," such as the "mouth to neck" language of the Narrative Summary of the Medical Examiner's field report, the witness at the funeral home who stated (apparently in all innocence) that there was an exit wound in the back of Foster's neck at the base of his hairline, etc., etc.

Notes on Methodology

I have referred to the borrowed human skull I used as being, within less than a percent of error, 80% (in each dimension) of the size of Foster's head. How the heck did I figure that out? I made an assumption that I thought was reasonable.

I got "from" Foster's head "to" my borrowed skull via an intermediate step: using my own head. I thought it was reasonable to approximate the size of Foster's head by scaling upward from my own head. The ratio I used was the ratio of our heights (6" 4.5" for Foster and, standing tall, 5' 11" for me).

This is obviously an approximation, but based on looking at photos of Foster and me (comparing the head to the rest of the body), I believe that scaling the heads using our heights was reasonable.

That is, I think that Foster and I are both more or less "big headed" people (for our respective heights) and that, in particular he is not a "small headed" person and I am not a "big headed" person (no snickering, please). In short, I assumed out heads were reasonably geometrically similar in shape and cross section except that Foster’s head was bigger in proportion to the ratio of our heights.

Once I "scaled" Foster's head to my head, I then used various dimensions on my head and the equivalent dimensions on my skull to determine a series of ratios.

All those ratios were very close to each other, giving me confidence that the method to get from "my head" to "my borrowed skull" was a reasonable one. All these very similar amounts, when averaged, came out to a fraction of a percent over 80%.

I am sure the method I described above introduced some errors, but I believe they were very modest, especially when compared to the modest errors introduced by the autopsy measurements themselves.

That is, even if you believe that the autopsy doctor measured to the nearest one-eighth inch in making all his measurements (because, say, he recorded one dimension of the exit wound to the nearest one-quarter inch, and that precision should be controlling rather than rather than his measurements of distances between two different parts of the body (rather than across an exit wound) which he reported to the half-inch, the estimating errors I introduced would be relatively small.

I also made all measurements to the nearest millimeter (on the anatomical diagram, one the skull, on the autopsy's Body Diagram - Head, etc.) except for a very few measurements (on my head and on the borrowed skull) which I measured to the nearest sixteenth of an inch (using a flexible measuring tape used for sewing).

An example of a measurement (and I repeated each measurement three or four times to get an average and to check on reproducibility) made with the sewing tape was the measurement of the distance around my head and around my borrowed skull in the nearly horizontal plane that included the furthest rearward extension of my head (the occipital protuberance) and the very top of my nose just below the eyebrows.

Subsequent Independent Corroboration of Wound Location

The point on the accompanying anatomical diagram that plots the location thereon of my "best estimate" of the point on the posterior oropharynx 7.5" below the top of Foster’s head (3.8" on the hard copy of the accompanying anatomical diagram) – namely the point on the diagram that is 2.5 mm vertically below Point 1 (see discussion above) – was subsequently independently corroborated by J. C. Huntington.

J. C. Huntington "scaled" a face-front photo of Vince Foster and located the "7.5 inch point" by using the FBI Lab Report in the official record (Tab 1 of the Fiske Report, dated May 9, 1994, at Page 12). Information in that report indicated that the distance between the pupils of Foster’s eyes (based on the 71 and 73 mm PDs from two pair of Foster’s prescription eyeglasses) was approximately 72 mm.

Mr. Huntington's work is at his website.

Hugh Sprunt s a CPA and Attorney in Dublin, California. Investigating the Foster case has been an avocation of his since the July 20, 1993, death. His ~380-page report on the death is available for just the cost of copying and shipping from various print shops around the US (Try 301-937-6500).

He serves on the legal team of Foster federal grand jury witness Patrick Knowlton (Attorney-of-Record, John H. Clarke, Washington DC, 202-332-3030). Mr. Sprunt also has been a guest on some 200 radio and television programs concerning the Foster death, including appearances on CBN, A&E, MSNBC, C-SPAN, and NET (now America's Voice). His work has been utilized by the authors of two books on the Foster death published in late 1997, Chris Ruddy's The Strange Death of Vincent Foster and Ambrose Evans-Pritchard's The Secret Life of Bill Clinton.