Initial blow fly development and larval mass formation in a funeral home cooler: analysis of insect evidence in the suspected desecration of a cadaver.

Necrophagous insects are often used in cases of suspicious death to estimate the minimum post-mortem interval (minPMI) and, less frequently, to provide evidence of the movement of a body, the antemortem neglect, intoxication or the post-mortem handling of a body. In the current case, the body of a victim of a train accident, heavily infested with fly larvae, was delivered by a funeral home to the autopsy. As a result, the prosecutor's office was notified of the suspected desecration of the cadaver, by storing it outside the funeral home's cooler. The entomological analysis was ordered to indicate, whether the body had been stored in or outside of a cooler. By reconstructing thermal conditions at the scene of death and in the funeral home's cooler, and simulating the initial development of blow flies (Calliphoridae: Lucilia sericata and L. caesar) under cooling conditions, the analysis provided evidence that, under the conditions of this case, the flies were able to complete their egg and early larval stages in the cooler, ultimately forming a massive aggregation of third instar larvae, as revealed at the autopsy. Therefore, insect evidence proved crucial in concluding that the body had indeed been stored in a cooler and had not been desecrated. This is the first case report demonstrating the successful development of the initial life stages of blow flies in a cooler and one of the few cases of insect development under cooling conditions. This case report also perfectly illustrates the specific conditions that favor such development. The two key factors in this respect are thermal conditions on the cadaver that conduce insect colonization and development (both before the body is placed in a cooler and during the storage itself) and abundance of the insects.