# How can a serious court return a verdict of "spontaneous human combustion"?



## Brendan Burgess (23 Sep 2011)

From today's Indo

Man dies from spontaneous human combustion



> Michael Faherty (76)  died as a  result of the phenomenon, spontaneous human combustion, according to  west Galway coroner Dr Kieran McLoughlin.
> 
> ...
> Assistant chief fire officer Gerry O'Malley said fire officers were  satisfied that, after a thorough investigation, an open fire in Mr  Faherty's fireplace was not the cause of the blaze which led to his  death.
> ...


I can't believe that a public official could come to this conclusion in Ireland in the 21st century and that all the newspapers have reported  it so uncritically. 

An elderly man is found with his head close to an open fire and they think that the body spontaneously combusted.

There have been many reports over the years of SHC, but no one has ever witnessed it. 

They are usually elderly people.

They are usually near fireplaces. 

Someone burning to death is a tragedy but there is no need to make a farce of it. 

Brendan


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## zztop (23 Sep 2011)

Wel..the Theory of Relativity is now under review
folowing 3 yeras review that found particles nanoseconds
faster.Can you believe anything.


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## horusd (23 Sep 2011)

It's hard to credit alright. But SHC was a hot topic in literature like Dicken's_ Bleak House_ in the 19th Century, so it's a lot of traction in the public mind. What was it that Sherlock Holmes said? Something like if you eliminate all other possibilities, the only other remaining explanation  must be true, however improbable!


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## The_Banker (23 Sep 2011)

If a condition like spontaneous combustion existed then it would be witnessed by someone at sometime. 

I have read up about it quite a lot and the people who did witness it date back to the 19th century and beyond.
There have never been credible eye witness accounts.

Why does it always happen to someone who is alone? Why doesnt it happen to someone at a restaurant?

This is like the Loch Ness monster. Urban myth. 

I can see why the Independent printed this as they love this kind of reporting but for a qualified coroner to state it in open court is strange.


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## Vanilla (23 Sep 2011)

It was a coroners court, not a law court.

Coroners court are strange places with a mix of the absurd and the formal. Many of the current coroners have simply 'inherited' the title and have no forensic or specialised knowledge.

I remember ones where the Gardai had to go out on the streets before hand to round up enough members of the jury to make up the quorum. 

Because there was no evidence of a crime, effectively what difference does it make what is put on the death cert?


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## micmclo (23 Sep 2011)

zztop said:


> Wel..the Theory of Relativity is now under review
> folowing 3 yeras review that found particles nanoseconds
> faster.Can you believe anything.



You mean Einstein was a fraud and a charlatan? 



horusd said:


> It's hard to credit alright. But SHC was a hot topic in literature like Dicken's_ Bleak House_ in the 19th Century, so it's a lot of traction in the public mind.



The BBC adaptation is all you on youtube.
Gillian Anderson, Charles Dance, Timothy West and other excellent actors
Excellent viewing if you've a few hours

As for the ending, ah some things never change and it was no surprise who got all the money


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## horusd (23 Sep 2011)

The_Banker said:


> I...
> Why does it always happen to someone who is alone? Why doesnt it happen to someone at a restaurant?
> 
> ...



Because, (sigh), _*obviously *_people are far too polite to spontaneously combust in a restaurant and put other's off their dinner.  It's just not the done thing.


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## Remix (23 Sep 2011)

I'm curious as to what people think is the inference to the best explanation given the facts. 

There was fire damage to floor below him and the ceiling above him.

If his clothes caught fire from the fireplace you might expect the unfortunate man to have serious injuries or to have died from burns. 

But the body is described as being in a 'cremated' state consistent with being completely consumed by fire.

The report says no accelerants had been found. However no details on the forensic detection method was given. According to some google articles the detection of accelerants can be a controversial topic.


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## oldnick (23 Sep 2011)

Most people in the world , and especially in this country-over 80%, believe that there is some sort of divine power that created everything and guides and looks over us.

Even more of a "farce" (to use Brendans word about the possibility of SHC) is that even in "advanced" societies like the USA -40% actually believe in the literal word of the Bible. -i.e. no evolution , all the miracles really took place as stated etc etc.

I bet many people reading this believe in a God and ghosts, though i gather that belief in the Tooth Fairy and Santa Claus tends to decline after childhood, (though I'm unsure why one places more credibility in some guy in the heavens than in one on a sleigh- how else do those presents get here?).

So, if people believe in things for which there has been no proof whatsoever why the blazes be surprised about a belief in SHC, for which actually there have been some almost scientifically credible explanations.


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## michaelm (23 Sep 2011)

Remix said:


> I'm curious as to what people think is the inference to the best explanation given the facts.


Spontaneous human combustion is a misnomer for the Wick effect.


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## Brendan Burgess (23 Sep 2011)

Vanilla said:


> It was a coroners court, not a law court.
> 
> Coroners court are strange places with a mix of the absurd and the formal. Many of the current coroners have simply 'inherited' the title and have no forensic or specialised knowledge.



Vanilla

Thanks for explaining that. I was wondering how a court which should be evidence-based could arrive at such a conclusion.

So who gets the jobs as coroners?  Solicitors? Doctors? Anyone?


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## Remix (23 Sep 2011)

PubMed has some academic articles on the Wick Effect. In one experiment a pig carcass was wrapped in particular materials and the effect was induced when 1L of accelerent fuel was pored and ignited.

I did come across one article on PubMed that appears to use SHC and the Wick Effect as synonyms rather as a misnomer. i.e the effect may have gained enough acceptance that the term SHC implies the Wick Effect. Terms can acquire a new meaning that don't reflect their original meaning. 

But I have no idea what the coroner was actually thinking. I'm not sure either though if enough evidence was present for all the necessary conditions for the Wick Effect to be conclusively proven.

Imho it might have been better to simply state something along the lines of having no conclusive explanation given the facts available but no foul play was suspected.


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## Remix (23 Sep 2011)

Brendan Burgess said:


> Vanill
> 
> So who gets the jobs as coroners? Solicitors? Doctors? Anyone?


 

According to 

[broken link removed]

The "core professions .. are very much those of medicine and law".


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## ajapale (23 Sep 2011)

The following well written extract comes from that document:



> There are perhaps few public services as poorly understood or indeed as poorly appreciated as the coroner service. Its association with what are often tragic circumstances does not encourage the general public to look behind the process of death investigation of which the public inquest is an important but not the sole aspect of coroner work.
> 
> The role of the coroner has evolved over hundreds of years and its present shape and organisation is very similar to that which existed
> before the turn of the last century. Apart from the Coroners Act 1962 which updated some legislative aspects of coroner work, there has
> ...





> The current position is that a coroner must, at time of appointment, be either a practising solicitor or barrister, or a registered
> medical practitioner. The reasons for this go back to early in the last century when the office of coroner was being upgraded, having fallen
> somewhat in status. The drive to “professionalising” the office was reflected in the introduction of these kinds of qualifications. The
> argument might be made today that if the carrying out of coroner functions requires a particular set of detailed skills and professional
> knowledge, how can coroners be either a doctor or a lawyer?


So it seems that a coroner has to be a doctor or a laywer and can not be a forensic scientist.


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## Vanilla (23 Sep 2011)

AFAIK the majority are GPs, with the rest solicitors. A coroner can have a deputy and I believe many deputies end up as 'acting' coroner, thus effectively inheriting the position. A reform has been proposed for some some time but not yet put in place. 

I suppose an argument could be made that the coroner is really just an administrative figure head and hears the evidence of witnesses plus the state pathologist etc and therefore doesnt need specialist knowledge in themselves but they do tend to direct the jury towards a verdict. I know from personal knowledge that many of the jury members are the same old people, available to go to the coroners court, retired people etc and are used to the routine.


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## Black Sheep (23 Sep 2011)

Very odd indeed, and his daughter was satisfied with extent of the investigation!!!!


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## Remix (23 Sep 2011)

Going back to the original case, I think it's important not to just make the assumption that the coroner suggested a non-material cause.

The Scientists on pubMed demonstrated conclusively that the ignition and total combustion of a pig carcass can be achieved with a smaller than expected fire source initiated with 1L of accelerant. 

They also demonstrated therefore that the alleged phenomenon of SHC can be and is subject to scientific hypothesis and testing.

Scientific knowledge being tentative and expanding, who can be sure that future experiments devised under different controls will not show higher rates of combustion than the currently understood Wick Effect?

The coroner was told there was no evidence of an accelerant and he said this case "fits into the category of spontaneous human combustion, for which there is no adequate explanation".

So taking that there is no current adequate explanation for this case and also taking that the phenomenon known as SHC can be subject to ongoing scientific enquiry and discovery, I'm starting to think his statement is not as bad as it first seems.

I think it only qualifies as "steam venting" material if the reader makes the assumption he was implying a supernatural cause.


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## horusd (23 Sep 2011)

micmclo said:


> *You mean Einstein was a fraud and a charlatan?*
> 
> 
> 
> ...




The speed of the particle is something like 60 millonth's of a second faster than light. How this makes any great difference is beyond me, but apparently, if true, it will. 


Don't tell me the end of Bleak House, I'm more than half way thro the book. 

Back on topic, I'n suprised that the Coronor didn't return an open verdict. Surely this is an option in a case like this?


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## Remix (23 Sep 2011)

micmclo said:


> You mean Einstein was a fraud and a charlatan?


 
Einstein also had an extra-marital affair and his wife found out about it. 

So married guys take note. If Einstein couldn't figure out a way of getting away with it......


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## Purple (24 Sep 2011)

michaelm said:


> Spontaneous human combustion is a misnomer for the Wick effect.



You beat me to it.
The whole idea of spontaneous human combustion has been comprehensively debunked. The Coroner obviously doesn't watch the Discovery channel.


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## Brendan Burgess (24 Sep 2011)

Remix said:


> Going back to the original case, I think it's important not to just make the assumption that the coroner suggested a non-material cause.
> 
> ...
> 
> I think it only qualifies as "steam venting" material if the reader makes the assumption he was implying a supernatural cause.



Not at all. 

There is no such thing as Spontaneous Human Combustion. 

As I understand the wick effect, there still has to be some outside spark. 

The Coroner said that the fire was not the cause and therefore it had to be spontaneous human combustion. 

It is far more likely that the investigators made an error in concluding that the fire was not the cause than some unnatural process took place.


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## onq (24 Sep 2011)

An expert in death confirms the cause was spontaneous human combustion.

An expert in fire related emergencies confirms the fire in the room was not the cause

Do old people die in mysterious circumstances where part or all of their bodies are burnt as if by an intense heat while the surroundings show few if any effects?

Yes, this is attested and the "wick effect is well known".

Denial of facts is a form of madness.

Hint:

Rebutting experts by citing the "discovery channel" isn't making THEM look unconvincing.


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## hastalavista (24 Sep 2011)

The link from the indo in the first post is dead: is that an omen?
[broken link removed]

IT has it also so not fair to skewer the indo, in this case anyway

Re onq



> An expert in death confirms the cause was spontaneous human combustion.


Where is this?

Confirming cause of death.....


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## Purple (24 Sep 2011)

onq said:


> An expert in death confirms the cause was spontaneous human combustion.
> 
> An expert in fire related emergencies confirms the fire in the room was not the cause
> 
> ...




Spontaneous Human Combustion is a myth. It is nonsense. It has no basis in fact or science.  
If the same supposed experts who claim spontaneous human combustion said the man was murdered by pixies or executed by aliens I'd be equally critical.

Hint: read my post again. I never rebutted the so-called experts by citing the discovery channel. I simply said it seemed they didn't watch it. If they knew their business they wouldn't have made such a verdict in the first place. Things that are 60-70% water don't generally spontaneously combust; there is always an outside cause.


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## ajapale (24 Sep 2011)

I see the original link from the indo has now gone dead. But not before it flashed around the world. I heard a reference to the case on BBC World Service last night.

Heres my take on it: 

The coroner reached the conclusion that this death was unexplained. He "googled" this and found what looked like some plausable references to SHC on the internet. He made an mistake in referencing SHC in his findings. He could have just returned an open verdict but taking the needs of the next of kin in mind decided SHC might be of more benfit to them.

I think we all (professionals or otherwise) fall into the trap of googling something and accepting as fact something we read on the internet or see on the Discovery Channel.

aj


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## Remix (24 Sep 2011)

I don't know how much he learns from the telly  but he's very likely aware of the Wick Effect. In a BBC interview he said he referred to Professor Bernard Knights book on forensic pathology. The Wick Effect is described in the section on "Atypical Localized Burning an Spontaeous Combustion". The book is obviously dismissive of the spontaneous element but recognizes that many cases in this category are on record.

It's not uncommon in the medical field for descriptive terms to loose their original meaning but still remain in use. For example 'coma' means deep sleep but a person in a coma is not in a deep sleep and the brain shows disorganised patterns of activity totally unlike those of sleep. But nobody would deny a person is in coma by focussing purely on the literal meaning of the term.

Similiarly the term "spontaneous human combustion" appears to have become a catch-all category for all the strange instances of fatal burning that have occurred in apparently inexplicable cases where the ignition source is destroyed. One can easily think of better terms but unfortunately it this one that has stuck.

The most complete test of the wick effect that I have come across was published in the Journal of Forensic Science with a summary on pubMed. A pig carcass was used in the experiment. 

The similarity of pig fat and muscle tissue to those in humans is well recognised. (In fact on a morbid note, scientists involved in terminal ballistics research with the goal of killing or maiming humans, have used pigs as a substitute for humans in their tests.)

But in the Wick experiment a necessary condition was 1L of fuel to provide the sustained temperature and burning to initiate the wick effect. If this article represents the best understanding of the effect in peer-reviewed literature, then one can see why having no evidence of an accelerant presents a problem in this particular case.

There has to be some mundane - possibly the wick effect or possibly still unknown - cause to this and similiar cases. There has to be because as someone pointed out, nowadays if this were divine intervention we'd be seeing it every day 


Edit: p.s. the article is still available on the indo site. Link may have changed:
http://www.independent.ie/national-...rom-spontaneous-human-combustion-2886192.html


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## Guest105 (24 Sep 2011)

I thought it was Michael Flatley there for a moment, I was thinking that he overstepped the mark


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## michaelm (26 Sep 2011)

zztop said:


> Wel..the Theory of Relativity is now under review
> folowing 3 yeras review that found particles nanoseconds
> faster.Can you believe anything.


Best neutrino joke I've seen so far . .
The barman says "we don't serve neutrinos in here" . . . a neutrino walks into a bar.


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## Brendan Burgess (12 Nov 2011)

*[broken link removed]*


At least the Donegal coroner did a bit of research. (I wonder did he read this thread?) 



> “There was a high level of cyanide in the blood stream and carbon  monoxide in the atmosphere, which is not normally there. There was no  antemortem damage,” the coroner said.
> “Death was caused by fire.  There was talk of spontaneous human combustion at the time. I did a  little research and that probably is an urban myth but when I did see  the remains, it did come to mind . . . I believe the clothes acted like a  wick on a candle”.
> The jury returned a verdict of death by fire.


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## Brendan Burgess (24 Nov 2011)

And now, the State Pathologist adds her weight

[broken link removed]



> STATE PATHOLOGIST Prof Marie Cassidy has described the idea of  spontaneous human combustion as a “myth” enjoyed by fiction writers.
> 
> ...
> She described spontaneous combustion as a myth and a theory that has not been valid for 500 years.
> ...


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## Complainer (24 Nov 2011)

Conor Brady saw it happen with his own eyes, so it must be true;

[broken link removed]


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## Brendan Burgess (25 Nov 2011)

Hi Complainer 

That is a great article. A good insight into news journalism and it's interesting that the editors held back an enthusiastic young journalist from making a fool of himself and the paper. 

Brendan


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