Particularly Unusual Deaths
The deaths on this page are especially unusual or particularly memorable in some way that might not precisely fit into an existing category.
1892
A man was working on a steel rod, although it was hard to tell what he was doign exactly from the file, the handwriting is so hard to read. He fell off the rod and ruptured his urethra. Sounds painful! 189212_30
NM 04 April 2008
1894
A 7-year-old boy died a few days after accidentally shooting himself in the hand with a 75 cent toy pistol. According to witness reports, he did not consider it serious until a day or two before he died. Judging by this, it seems as though the wound became infected and possibly even gangrenous. Whatever the case, I found it appalling that any responsible parent would let a wound like this go uncared for, let alone allow their 7-year-old to play with a toy gun. 189407_398
MWB 07 Apr 2008
A man was shooting a double barrelled shotgun with his friend. When it was his turn to shoot, he shot one shot and the gun flew out of his hand. When it hit the ground, the second shot went off and killed him. 189407_377
BF 10 April 2008
1895
An 8-year-old boy tripped and fell while walking in the street. He died when his pencil, which he fell on, pierced his heart. 189510_136
NM 11 April 2008
1897
A 44 or 45-year-old woman dies of paralysis. Her granddaughter tried to wake her but could not. She had a stroke two months before, was stout, and complained of a pain in her hip that moved up to her shoulder over the course of the previous day. 189712_216
AP 25 April 08
1898
A 35-year-old white man was poisoned from drinking wood alcohol. He came home sick and vomiting, told his wife about it. She insisted he go to a doctor, but he refused to go. The wife went to see the doctor anyway and he gave him some medicine for him to take, but it did no good, he died a day or so later. 189801_263
AP 25 April 08
A 50-year-old white man dies of alcoholism, was a “honey drinker.” This file is interesting because within it is a random photo (with no apparent connection to the victim) of Morris E. Moses, author of The Bride’s Letter or After the Honeymoon. 189801_268
AP 25 April 08
A 24-year-old white man dies from exhaustion and possible blood loss from a previous operation. He took a weak spell while walking down the street; he was carried into a home and died there. His previous operation was an amputation, May 30, 1898, and he had not fully recovered from it, he was prone to weak spells from that time on. 189811_165
AP 25 April 08
1918
In March, a 26 year old laborer died from Pertonitis following a rupture of rectum, due to injection of compressed air. He was at work (at the Westinghouse Plant, 28th St, Pittsburgh) and a fellow workman was playing around and put the compressed air hose "at his back" and turned it on. The rectum ruptured in several places and the docotrs were not able to help because the sutures failed to hold.
191803-190
AFS June 09, 2008
One teenage girl met her death from her acne in June of 1918. She apparently was displeased with a pimple on her forehead, so she pricked it with a pin and developed septicemia. 191806-258
AFS July 01, 2008
A 44-year-old Austrian man, working as a butcher at the Sun Packing Company in Spring Garden, PA, died from septicemia after being gored by a bullock while preparing to kill it. 191802_103.
RLM Jul 7 08
A man died at Braddock General Hospital on January 4 from peritonitis following perforations of his urethra and intestines. On his hospital bed, the man revealed that on December 30 he was chased by the police in Patton Township on suspicion of stealing whiskey, which he denied. He hid in a stranger's coal shed. When the owner of the house came out for coal, he saw the man and brought him inside. In the house the man was assaulted by a woman and two men. A hot instrument was forced into his rectum, an act unnervingly deemed justifiable by the Coroner's Jury. Although this man was trespassing, I was so disgusted by the Jury's verdict . . . self-defense is one thing, but a gross act such as this seems to me unexcusable under any circumstance. 191802_199.
RLM Jul 7 08
A 35 year old man fell from a roller coaster at Olympia Amusment Park and died from the injuries that same day at the McKeesport Hospital.
191808-026
AFS 09 July 2008
I have two cases of women in childbirth dying from Eclampsia. This is the first time I have seen it so i decided to research in further. Eclampsia can cause seizures and death, of the mother or child, before after or during giving birth. The exact causes are unknown. Both of the women in the files died in a hospital.
191811-301 and 191811-333
AFS 15 July 2008
1919
A man died due to a fractured skull after he fell off of his roof... while sleepwalking. Aparently he had climbed out his bedroom window onto a roof and had falled off of it and struck his head on the sidewalk. His family knew he was a sleep walker and had someone sleep in the bedroom with him but they did not wake up until it was too late.
191902-292
AFS 05 Aug 2008
1927
A 3-year-old died of burns when 5 lbs. of black powder that had been stored on the second floor of the house exploded. The cause of the explosion was undetermined. 19272_51
A 6-year-old girl was accidentally shot by her 14-year-old sister with an old revolver the sister found in the attic of their house in McKeesport, PA. 192712_116
A man fell 21 stories to his death while working on the construction of the Law & Finance Building at 4th and Cherry Way. 192712_128
A worker died while working in a manhole when a co-worker lit a match as they were repairing a gas leak. 192712_172
Twenty-eight people died when a gas tank owned by Equitable Gas exploded on November 14, 1927. A worker had been repairing the gas tank, which was filled with natural gas, with a welding torch. At least one of the resulting deaths was a drowning caused when a water main burst due to the gas tank explosion. 192712_187
Two brothers murdered each other. The brothers got into a fight at one of their houses. The brother who owned the house was able to kick the other out. Still infuriated, the kicked-out brother went to his own house and retrieved his gun. He returned to his brother’s house, went around to the back door and knocked. As soon as his brother opened the door he shot him in the stomach. Having shot and killed his brother he returned to his house where Turtle Creek police arrest him. He was then transferred to the county jail. At this point the story twists. The last brother died in prison due to complications of a bite wound he received while fighting with his brother. 192703_14-192703_16
1928
A man committed suicide by jumping into ingot steel at a mill. 192803_291
1929
A man died of burns after the gasoline canister he had been holding exploded. He had been washing his hands with the gasoline, near a coal furnace, while smoking a cigarette. 192904_37
A worker at one of Duquesne Light's power plants died when inspecting an empty but unventilated fuel tank. He had been wearing a Burrell "all-purpose" canister gas mask, and had taken precautions such as arranging emergency signals and a lifeline. It appears that the "all-purpose" mask was only designed to be used when there was oxygen present and when the toxins present in the air were not over 3%, but this was unknown to both the workers and management. The Federal Bureau of Mines investigated the death. 192911_37
1931
In an interesting death, a teenage boy fell from the front seat of The Dips roller coaster at West View Park (193107_91). He was foolishly standing up in the front car when he fell out. I wonder if this particular death or many other deaths like this urged amusement park safety regulations. Were there warning signs as you see in today's parks saying that pregnant women, elderly, people with heart conditions, etc., should not ride the rides? Unfortunately, no good picture of this ride exists. Posted below is an artist’s rendition of the ride, which I think is pretty accurate based on other pictures I have seen.
MG 10 Oct 2007
From http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://www.lindabarnicott.com/current/images/doingdips.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.lindabarnicott.com/current/doingdips.html&h=280&w=456&sz=48&hl=en&start=19&sig2=JK3g6fG6Cx1YMoxSvJTNfQ&tbnid=-T_LMsmisDdImM:&tbnh=79&tbnw=128&ei=oYQNR62bFpzyeOau4Y8M&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dwest%2Bview%2Bpark%2Bthe%2Bdips%2Broller%2Bcoaster%26start%3D18%26gbv%3D2%26ndsp%3D18%26svnum%3D10%26hl%3Den%26sa%3DN
Case file 193108_226 involved an incident in which a man was thrown against a wall when the beer barrel he was attempting to tap exploded due to a build up of carbon dioxide pressure. Included in the file was a diagram of the contraption in which the barrel was connected. It contained a bottle of compressed air connected to the barrel by a hose, with another hose to control the amount of air pressure in the barrel. Two other men were upstairs at the time of the incident working on expanding their "booze club" at the time the accident occurred. It would be interesting to see if the other men were charged with illegally possessing and distributing alcohol since the 21st Amendment repealing prohibition would not be enacted for two more years.
ZB 12 Oct 2007
I found a number of deaths where a man was working on his car while it was running with the garage door shut. The man then died from carbon monoxide poisoning. It was surprising to see how many times this actually happened.
CL 12 Oct 2007
A baby boy fell into a five-gallon can of hot coffee while at his grandmother's house. 193107_17
JT 23 Oct 2007
1932
In May 1932 there was a particularly interesting death. The cause of death was ruled as "Broncho-Pneumonia" (also known as Lobular Pneumonia) due to second and third degree burns on the neck and chest. The child, unattended, had spilled a cup of scalding hot coffee down the front of his shirt. The hot liquid apparently saturated his shirt and caused extensive burns on his chest and neck. While lobular pneumonia is not an uncommon cause of death or illness during this time, the manner in which the child 'contracted' it is. It is unclear to me exactly how second and third degree topical burns could result in lobular pneumonia.
LEG 12 Oct 2007
A 9-year-old boy was lying in his bed in a third floor apartment when he was struck by lightning and killed. 193207_134.
BB 31 Oct 2007
1940
I have seen many files in which people died from burning themselves with boiling water when a pot overturned. Case file 194011_77, however, seemed like an extreme case to me. A woman was drinking her morning coffee and she spilled it on herself. He sister heard her scream and came to her rescue. A doctor came to look at her and sent her to the hospital to treat the burns. The woman died later that night "from toxemia following scalds of abdomen and thigh from spilling coffee.” Her coffee must have been boiling hot to cause such a terrible burn that she died the same day. I will be much more careful while drinking my morning coffee from this point forward.
AL 26 Oct 2007
A 13-year-old boy was killed while bicycling when he was hit by a landing airplane -- he had been biking on the runway at Bettis Air Field. 194008_107
BB 31 Oct 2007
1942
The unusual death I have to report is a death by manic depressive psychosis. The file listed this as the cause of death but the file reported that the person was not eating or drinking and likely died of dehydration. The man's wife actually took him out of the hospital early against doctor’s orders. In the file it contained release papers that said the hospital is not responsible for anything that happened to the man after he was taken away. The strange part is that the doctors took x-rays of the man's skull and it showed a nasal accessory sinus and a disease of left maxillary with septal deviation to same side. The doctors took out some impacted teeth. They thought this would cure the man, but to their dismay he actually got worse.
CL 02 Nov 2007
1943
Case file 194310_187 holds the story of a particularly careless way to die- a man that was trampled by a bull after he waived a corn stalk in its face. The bull continued to trample him until the man's son stoned the bull and it ran away.
AL 09 Nov 2007
1948
While doing the family laundry a woman was struck in the face by the clothesline when it came out of the ground. She died 20 days later from subdural hemorrhage. 194807_75
JT 04 Dec 2007
1953
Case 195307_92 is the record of a hobo, an "unknown colored man," who was found naked and dead on some railroad tracks by a railroad crew. His body was already in a bad state of decomposition when it was discovered. His trousers were later found in a cave 25 feet directly above the spot where he died. The police said that they saw no indication of foul play on the body, and no apparent cause of death. Another hobo was arrested and detained as a suspect in this man's death, but was eventually released on lack of evidence.
LB 17 Jan 2008
1954
Case 195412_198 tells the bizarre demise of a 54-year-old man who was stabbed to death with an umbrella. As he and a female friend were getting into a car he was suddenly attacked by a man wielding an umbrella and received wounds to the cranial cavity and brain. The attacker was charged with murder, although no motive was given as to why he attacked the man.
LB 17 Jan 2008
1955
A 74-year-old woman died of third degree burns received due to her clothing catching on fire when her gas stove exploded. 195503_23
LB 17 Jan 2008
1958
A 25-year-old pregnant woman died of blood loss when her previous cesarean section scar ruptured. She was eight to nine months pregnant at the time. She had complained the night before of pain and vomiting and was cold prior to going to hospital. Her female baby was still-born. 195801_154-195801_155
AP 29 Jan 2008
A man died of a perforated colon when he inserted an aluminum tube into his rectum. He did this to make his colostomy wound feel better. His doctor actually prescribed the aluminum tube to the man so he could relieve his pain. 195810_72
BF 30 Jan 2008
1959
A 40-year-old steel-working patron of a local tavern stuck around till closing time to chat with the owner, whom he was friendly with. They joked with one another as the remaining customers said their farewells. At this time they engaged in a brief and playful scuffle. The bar owner gave the patron a punch in the belly which started some internal bleeding. In all probability the patron was thoroughly intoxicated at this point, because he did not seem to be aware of the severity of his own injury. Everyone was tired, so they went back to their respective homes and go to bed. The next day the patron complains to his wife of some stomach pains which he believed was caused by food poisoning. A few hours later he died. The death came as a shock to everyone involved, and was declared accidental. 195909_206
RB 18 Feb 2008
A Homestead man died after being hurled into a garden at the rear of his backyard by a gas explosion "of undetermined origin." Apparently he had been on the back porch of the two-story frame house where he, his wife, and another family resided when he went to light a cigarette. In the process of lighting the cigarette he accidentally ignited gas that authorities said had been accumulating in the house. According to the one of the members of the other family, the explosion felt like the house had just been hit by lighting. Damage to the home, which blew out most of the first floor, was estimated at $7,500. The man's wife was also admitted to the hospital for shock. 195911_65
MWB 04 Feb 2008
A man died from tetanus due to overdoes of narcotics. He had been doing heroin for about eight years; the man's wife had left him some time earlier because he would not stop doing drugs. He was found by a neighbor. This is the first illegal-drug related death I have come across in these records. 195910_92
LB 08 Feb 2008
1960
A 65-year-old Sewage Disposal Plant worker fell into a tank of raw sewage and drowned. His body was later found at bottom of the disposal tank. 196001_40
AP 15 Feb 2008
A 15-year-old boy "accidentally" hanged himself from a bed side board with a clothes belt. The parents were out shopping for the boy's birthday, his siblings were around the house doing their own thing, and he was in his room with the door closed so they did not bother him. His father felt the hanging was meant to be a practical joke on his brother. 196009_136
AP 25 Feb 2008
A Hill District man died of a crushed chest while helping a friend move a piano down a flight of stairs. Despite the friend's warnings, the man removed a piece of railing that was holding the piano at the top of the steps, and it came crashing down on him. He later died at the hospital. 196006_190
MWB 13 Feb 2008
A 60-year-old woman was sitting on an electric heating pad when there was a short circuit, and she received second degree burns on her posterior. She died nearly two months later in the hospital due to general debility following the burns. 196012_170
Another case involved a 69-year-old woman who caught her clothes on fire after trying to fill up her cigarette lighter with lighter fluid. No one had any idea how she managed to do that. 196012_171
LB 18 Feb 2008
A woman was in the backyard of her home doing yard work. There was a two million gallon reservoir near her backyard. The concrete wall of the reservoir broke and a 30 foot high wall of water came her way and swept her into the woods. She was found pinned against a tree by a piece of wood. She died of drowning. The wall of water also swept away a car, a few tool sheds, and also knocked over some utility poles. At the time of the accident an excavation company had been working on the reservoir in order to expand it. They had removed dirt from around the concrete walls of the reservoir, where the concrete broke. The reservoir had been built in 1910 and the breakage was blamed on faulty construction from back then. 196012_38
BF 24 Feb 2008
1961
A 25-year-old Dormont man died of toxemia following infection of the buttocks. He and his family were Christian Science Advocates, so they did receive any medical care save from a Christian Science Practitioner. It seems that the infection began with a carbuncle on his buttocks, which is a large abscess often consisting of several boils, about three weeks prior to his death. In her affidavit, the mother of the victim stated that he did not complain about it once until roughly ten days prior to his death. This leads me to conclude that the victim was either very stubborn or very brave, as the pain he went through must have been unimaginable. It is even more tragic that his death could have been avoided by simply going to a hospital. 196101_91
MWB 19 Feb 2008
In February of this year, a teenager playing with a gun stolen from a detective's car accidentally shot his older brother in the chest and abdominal area, killing him almost instantly. The two had been hanging in various locations on the South Side when the younger brother found a .45 caliber Remington handgun in the glove compartment of the above-mentioned car and showed it to his brother. They then went home, and the teenager apparently began playing with it, causing the gun to go off. It is worth noting that the boy did remove the clip prior to playing around with it, but this is another good example of how guns should always be treated as if they are loaded, no matter what. In this case, there was still a round chambered. The death was ruled accidental; primarily, it seems, because of the juvenile nature of the individuals involved. I would be interested to see what repercussions, if any, the detective suffered for his apparent carelessness. While it is somewhat hard to extract emotion from the court testimonials included, he did seem quite embarrassed. I should think that if something similar to this happened today, the detective would be suspended for quite some time, if not outright fired. 196102_192
MWB 21 Feb 2008
In November, a woman died from pulmonary edema resulting from smoke inhalation due to the shorting of an electric heating pad. According to affidavits, the blanket shorted out while it was plugged into the wall; however, the resulting fire did not spread beyond the living room and firefighters noted having difficulty with the smoke more than anything else. Out of sheer curiosity, I also looked up smoke detectors in Wikipedia and found that they were not invented until 1967. 196111_95
MWB 27 Feb 2008
This is the most baffling death that I have encountered so far. A 73-year-old man was in ill health, and kept a bucket next to his bed to relieve himself in. He lived with his daughter, but stayed locked in his own bedroom almost exclusively. After knocking on his door one morning and getting no response, the daughter broke into the room with a screwdriver, fearing her father has passed away. She found him on the floor in a kneeling position with his head lodged in the bucket/toilet. The cause of death is recorded as 'drowning in a bucket of urine.' The strangest part of this case was the fact that there was a loaded .32 caliber pistol resting on the bed stand when the police investigated. Was this death accidental, or some sort of bizarre suicide? Was this simply a twist on the fall-out-of-bed deaths that are so common among the elderly? One person I discussed this case with suggested foul play might be afoot. This file creates more questions than it answers. 196101_234
RB 27 Feb 2008
A 26-year-old married man out drinking at a tavern was aproached by a married prostitute, who took him back to her home for sexual intercourse. After they have finished their business and dressed, she requested her payment. The man then told the prostitute that he had no money on him, but she refused to let him leave until she has been paid, knowing full well that he would not return if she let him out. He went up to the third floor, leaving the angry woman on guard at the front door. A few moments later, his body hit the pavement and he died from internal injuries. Apparently he had not thought out his escape route very thoroughly. 196112_201
RB 11 Mar 2008
1962
A 90-year-old man died due to internal injuries he received when a he was struck by a falling skylight in his home. His wife was in the hospital at the time, and had to be told that her husband was in the same hospital due to this unusual accident. There are no details in the case file as to how the skylight fell out of its frame. 196204_23
LB 05 Mar 2008
A 68-year-old man died of diabetes ,ellitus and diabetic gangrene of the right foot in the State Correctional Institution Hospital. His health was so bad at this point that doctors could not risk amputation of foot, fearing he would not survive the operation. He was a crane man who worked at the prison. 196207_73
AP 24 March 2008
Two middle-aged brothers who have been out drinking all night cannot get a ride home as they had anticipated, and begin to walk while heavily intoxicated. The next day a worker spots a motionless body resting on a ledge about 10 feet beneath the Penn Railroad Bridge. This brother is only sleeping; he has minor injuries from his short fall. His sibling is not so lucky; he had fallen 75 feet to the bottom of the cliff where he received a fractured skull. At the lab, it was shown that the decedent had attained a whopping 32% BAC. The surviving brother recalls no details of how these events occurred. 196208_26
A remodeling mishap caused a 40-year-old man to be crushed when his front porch roof collapsed on him. 196208_51
RB 13 Mar 2008
1963
A 49-year-old black man was drunk and was drinking Quaker Sol with water. Quaker Sol, which is paint thinner, is usually mixed with water, soda, or wine and drank. Also, it can only be obtained on "the hill," which I assume refers to the Hill District. He died from ingestion of a poison, which probably came from the Quaker Sol, considering it is labeled as "poison." Also in the file, they spelled water W-A-R-T-E-R, which I found funny. 196304_47
NM 05 Mar 2008
A 68-year-old black male died of "acute alcoholism and strangulation on dentures due to unknown cause." The man was found at the bottom of his basement steps, but the autopsy revealed it was unlikely that he had fallen down them. He had been out drinking at a few bars that night with his son, but came home by himself. The man's dentures were lodged in the back of his throat and clamped tightly on the end of his tongue. 196306_68
TG 05 Mar 2008
An 87-year-old white male died of pulmonary edema due to auricular tachycardia with a contributing cerebral concussion and contusion of the scalp. The man was struck in the head by a piece of plywood that was blown off a boarded up building by the wind. The man was taken to the hospital and treated, then released. He died of complications from this injury three months later. 196306_146
TG 05 Mar 2008
An 82-year-old West Miffin man died of "Mesenteric Thrombosis with Gangrene of Small Intestines and Artenistenosis." Basically this meant that he had blood clots and of course gangrene in his small intestine. 196308_150
A 34-year-old Glassport man was killed when the hotel he was staying in collapsed on him, due to a "tornadic storm." The cause of death was listed as a crushed chest. According to some casual research I did online, the man was the town's only casualty of the entire storm. 196308_186
All: MWB 07 Mar 2008
The sixties were the era of auto-erotic misadventure. In this case, a 43-year-old man who loved to swim in the Allegheny River kept a pair of swimming shorts and an inner tube in his truck, so he could take a take a dip whenever he liked. One summer evening, he does not return home. A search begins and after a short while, his truck is found parked alongside a wooded road that led to the river. His clothing and work shoes were inside the truck, and the inner tube and swim shorts are absent. Believing the man went swimming and drowned, the river was dragged for several days with no result. It was assumed that the body has drifted away, and on June 20th the search is abandoned.
More than three months later, on October 12, a 14-year-old boy and his friends were out playing in a wooded area when they discover the decomposing body of this deceased man hanging from a tree. He had hung himself from a sapling, which had bowed down, causing the corpse to come to rest in a sitting position on the ground. His trunks and inner tube were resting in the grass behind the body, which was completely naked, except for a pair of ladies nylon stockings which he had rolled down to his knees. Another unopened package of stockings were also laying in the grass nearby. 196310_199
RB 15 April 2008
1964
In February of this year, a 4-year-old boy died of strangulation due to accidental hanging. The boy fell from a tree while trying to save a cat who was seemingly stuck there. As he fell, the collar of the jacket the boy was wearing became caught on a branch and strangled him to death. The boy was still hanging by his jacket from the tree when his mother came looking for him at dinner time. She told police that his face was blue and that she heard a gargling noise when she held him after releasing him from the jacket. He was pronounced dead at the hospital. 196402_84
TG 10 Mar 2008
A 33-year-old laborer over-inflated his truck tire and it exploded, blowing the rim right off the wheel. The rim struck him in the head, fracturing his skull. 196403_79
RB 15 April 2008
In December of this year the body of a 53-year-old man was found in his home by two teenage boys who had been playing near the house. The boys noticed the sound of running water coming from inside the house and decided to investigate. They entered the house through a broken cellar window and made their way to the second floor. They said there was a horrible odor inside the house. They finally reached the bedroom and saw the badly decomposed body of the deceased in the middle of his bed. The boys had known of the man who lived there, but had not seen him outside in three years. The deceased man's family stated that he kept to himself and it was normal for him to not speak to them for long periods of time. This was the reason that they did not suspect any problem with him until they were notified of his death. The press report and coroner's jury verdict of the file are marked, "skeleton." A report to the coroner said that there was little more than a skeleton left of the body. 196412_57
TG 12 Mar 2008
A 32-year-old man, a clerk, died from shock, extensive burns, and a crushed chest and body due to a fire truck overturning on him. No further information was given in the case file as to how this accidental death occurred, which is frustrating. Did the truck try to make a corner and turned over, falling on the deceased? Where did the burns come from? Were they brush burns? 196409_167
LB 13 Mar 2008
1965
This particular case description seemed simple enough at first- a 45-year-old man had been depressed lately, and had been in and out of hospitals for the past few months. His wife caught him at his tuxedo shop writing a suicide note, so she took him to the doctor, where they made arraignments to have him admitted to a hospital. Shortly thereafter, the man's wife called him at the shop, and he did not seem like he wanted to talk to her. She tried to call again sometime later, but he did not pick up. So she went to the shop with her brother-in-law, where they found him dead from a gunshot wound to the right temple, the gun at his feet. In an affidavit written the week after his death, the deceased man's wife expressed her belief that her husband had killed himself.
Fourteen letters in the case file, however, told a different story. Postmarked from July 1965 all the way to 1974, the wife of the deceased, the same one who was recorded as saying that her husband must have killed himself, changed her mind. Her letters all say variations of the same thing- her husband was murdered because there was no gunpowder found on his fingers and he was shot in the back of the head, not in the right temple (the latter which the funeral director can affirm to). The first letters ask the coroner to fix the mistake. The later letters berate the coroner and the police for not doing their jobs, the writer insisting that she will have justice, she knows who the killer is and will kill him herself and make the front page of the newspaper. She said that money was taken from the safe in the shop and the murderer left his gloves in the shop. She also told the coroner, and successive coroners, that her five children kow the truth as well and they deserve to have justice too; the coroner should think of the children. She said that she would pray for God to either give her an answer as to why her husband's death was still considered a suicide after all of those years or punish the coroner and the police for not doing their jobs. She continued these letters even when she moved to Florida years later. 196502_79
LB 13 Mar 2008
Several teenage girls were visiting a friend of theirs and her brother one afternoon. One of the girls asked the brother, who was about their age, for some wine because she had a sore throat. The boy went to the basement, where his parents kept the wine, took a wine bottle and poured out some wine for the girl. He went back upstairs and gave the glass to her. She drank some of it, but spit it out, saying that it tasted awful. The girl's sister also tasted it, saying that it was bad. Soon afterward the girl who had asked for the wine got sick and vomitted on and off for over an hour. She was finally taken home, and then to the hospital, where she died of gastro-entritis.
A few days later the boy was being questioned by his parents when his father asked the boy to show him from which bottle he had poured the wine. When the boy pointed it out the father turned the bottle around. On the other side was a homemade label that said "Poison." The bottle contained weed killer, which had 28 percent arsenic in it. 196502_180
LB 13 Mar 2008
In October of this year, a father, mother, and son died of carbon monoxide poisoning in their home on the same night. The family had been out celebrating the father's birthday that night. The 22-year-old son, a senior at Duquesne University, went to bed shortly after the family returned home. The newly 53-year-old father went to bed sometime after 3:00 a.m., leaving his wife, reportedly a heavy drinker, in the car inside the connected garage. The woman, 49, passed out inside the car with the motor running, dying of a 95% saturation of carbon monoxide in her blood. The father was found dead on the floor of his bedroom with a 90% saturation of carbon monoxide in his blood, likely being overcome shortly after he left his wife in the garage. The son's bedroom was unfortunately located directly above the garage and he was found dead with an 85% saturation of carbon monoxide in his blood. They were found by a friend of the father's who usually drove him to work in the morning. 196510.140, 196510_141, 196510_142
TG 17 Mar 2008
1970
In August of this year a 46-year-old black female died of respiratory arrest after being paralyzed due to the dislocation and transection of her spinal cord. The woman was trying to move a portable grill off her neighbor's porch when the floor collapsed and she fell through. 197008_261
TG 19 Mar 2008
A 53-year-old white man died of a fractured skull, infracts of the brain, myocardial hypertrophy and cirrhosis of the liver. He was a desk sergeant at McKees Rocks Police Station. A man was brought in for drunk and disorderly conduct; when he got to the deceased's desk, he pushed the desk sergeant, causing him to fall over backward and hit his head hard. He was knocked unconscious for a period and attempts were made to take him to the hospital, but he refused to go. About a week later, he started to complain of concussion-like symptoms and was taken to the hospital where he died a while later. The man who pushed him down was surprisingly not charged with anything more serious than a Drunk D.C.R.A. charge. 197011_74
AP 24 March 2008
Three older men were hunting ground hogs in a corn field near one of their houses. In order to cover all of the exits for the ground hog's lair, all of the men spread out. As one of the men looked through the scope of his rifle, he saw something brown bobbing up and down in the brush, so he shot at it. As it turns out, he shot his friend, who happened to be wearing a brown hat. It said that this victim was 97 years old, but in the autopsy photos he didn't have very much grey hair. He looked pretty good for his age. 197010_14
BF 27 March 2008
A young mentally challenged woman was locked out of the apartment in which she lived, so she tried to climb up the side of the building in order to get in through the roof. Unfortunately, she lost her footing near the top and plummeted to her death, three stories below. 197010_125
BF 27 March 2008
A man was in his yard and was stung by some yellow jackets on his neck and arm. He couldn't catch his breath and soon died. 197009_265
BF 27 March 2008
1971
An 21-year-old Eighty-Four man died after apparently falling 70 feet off a ramp at Three Rivers Stadium. There were no witnesses, but authorities surmised that there was no foul play and that the victim fell as a result of his own actions. Also, due to the fact that he was placed in the I.C.U. for an extended period of time, tests for alcohol were unable to be conducted, so it cannot be determined if the man was under the influence of that substance. Official cause of death was listed as "craniocerebral injuries." While some casual online research turned up no mention of this man's death nor any other deaths that might have occurred, it is very likely that if this is not the only death to occur at the stadium, it was more than likely the first, since Three Rivers had been in use for barely one year at this point in time. 197108_122
MWB 26 Mar 2008
Six employees of Equitable Gas died of acute methane gas asphyxiation. They were performing a routine procedure of replacing a valve on a gas line, but forgot to shut off the gas before removing the valve from the line. The gas started to leak, and then gushed out, causing the men in the pit to pass out. Two fellow Equitable Gas employees who tried to pull them out were overcome by the gas as well, but were pulled out of the hole alive by rescue workers. Pictures of the gas line and the gas valve being repaired, as well as a detailed report on the accident were included in a huge file on these six cases. 197111_257-197111_262
LB 27 Mar 2008
Youth was practing soccer with team at Shaler high school with the rest of the team. Then 16 year old boy was hit in the chest with a soccer ball and fell to the floor in pain and knock uncoiusious. This cause a bone to puncuture is lung. The boy was carried of to the hospital but was too late, DOA. 197109_091
BG 31 MAR 2008
1972
A 63-year-old man swallowed a toothpick while eating a hamburger at an Eat 'n Park. A few days later he experienced severe stomach pains, and was taken to the hospital. He was operated on and the toothpick was extracted. It had punctured the walls of his small intestine, however. He was fine right after the surgery, but had some problems in the days following with his urinary tract. He died eight days after he first came into the hospital of uremia due to urinary tract shutdown due to oerforation of the small intestine. 197204_14
LB 28 Mar 2008
A 43-year-old white man dies of acute combined tuinal and sinequan poisoning, manner considered to be undetermined. He was prescribed a number of drugs including serox for depression. He had a 25-year history of depression and he had undergone shock therapy a number of times for his depression as well. 197205_65
AP 25 April 08
A 7-year-old white male died of a bilateral hemothorax and hemoperitoneum due to lacerations of his heart and liver. Hemoperitoneum is the accumulation of blood between the inner wall of the abdomen and the internal organs. Because the abdomen can expand a great deal, massive blood loss occurs as a result. This is most commonly a surgical emergency. The boy was trying to run out of the front door of his house, but the door didn't open as he collided with it. The glass on the lower section of the door shattered and lacerated the boy's abdomen. His shirt became caught in the screen on the higher section of the door, and the boy had to be released from it with the help of his babysitter's boyfriend. He survived the ambulance ride to the hospital, but went into cardiac arrest around the time of his arrival and died shortly thereafter. 197206_210
TG 28 Mar 2008
A 23-year-old Irwin man died of Addison's disease. According to Wikipedia, "Addison's Disease is a rare endocrine disorder in which the adrenal gland produces insufficient amounts of steroid hormones (glucocorticoids and often mineralocorticoids). It may develop in children as well as adults, and may occur as the result of a large number of underlying causes. The condition is named after Dr Thomas Addison, the British physician who first described the condition in his 1855 On the Constitutional and Local Effects of Disease of the Suprarenal Capsules." 197209_06
MWB 31 Mar 2008
1973
A 14-year-old white male died of a gunshot wound to the head. The weapon inflicting this wound was a .177 caliber BB, or pellet rifle, fired at a distance of two feet by the boy's friend, who was also 14 years old. The two boys were in a wooded area near the house of the boy who owned and shot the rifle. The boy had been given the gun by his parents just five days earlier. He thought that the rifle's safety was on and as a joke, pointed the gun at his friend's head and pulled the trigger. The boy who was shot put his hands to his head and began to scream, at which point his friend ran to get his father, who called an amubulance and notified police. The boy died in the hospital that afternoon. According to a crime lab report, the gun was the, "air pump type," that would develop a higher firing velocity with each successive pump. A homicide detective working the case said that the BB gun had the same hitting power as a .32 caliber revolver when pumped eight times. As stated in its operation manual, the gun was not under the provisions of the, "Gun Control Act of 1968," and could therefore be ordered through a catalogue and received in the mail. As a result of this case, the coroner's office and police department recommended that this gun be restricted from sale through the mail under the Uniform Firearms Act. They stated that the gun's lethal force had been underestimated or withheld from the manuals accompanying it. An inquest into the death ruled it accidental and no charges were filed against the boy who shot the rifle at his friend. 197304_98
TG 02 Apr 2008
A 43-year-old white man was riding his bike with his 13-year-old son and his son's friend. He hit a bump and flew over a 40 foot embankment into the woods. His son rode to an uncle's house nearby, where an ambulance was called. Upon arrival at the hospital, the man was pronounced DOA from multiple blunt injuries of the head, neck, chest, and extremities. This case if the first instance of a death involving a bicycle that I have come across in these files.
LB 02 Apr 2008
A 26-year-old Highland Park man died of sarcoidosis, which according to Wikipedia is "an immune system disorder characterised by non-caseating granulomas (small inflammatory nodules) that most commonly arises in young adults." It is often asymptomatic (no symptoms), but a variety of symptoms do exist that are often difficult to diagnose. The article also suggests that this disease also affect blacks (which this man was) more severely than caucasians. It can affect any organ, but is at its worst when the liver, brain, or nervous system is affected. Even today, causes are still hard to pinpoint, and treatment is not without its own problems. 197307_103
In what must surely be a contender for the Darwin Awards, a 41-year-old African- American Wilkinsburg man died in Columbia Hospital after lacerating his wrist on a window he had broken in an attempt to burglarize the Pyrofax Gas Co. in Duncansville, Blair County. According to the coroner's inquest, he and another man who was from the North Side drove out to Duncansville with the initial intent of burglarizing the VFW Hall there at about 3am. Finding it still occupied however, they drove on and chose a target of opportunity, the gas company offices, and it was here that the incident occurred. Rather than go to a local hospital however, they drove all the way back to Pittsburgh, and of course by the time that they got to a hospital there, the man had died of exsanguination (blood loss). 197310_48
Both: MWB 03 Apr 2008
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