Murder Mystery(a true story)

[11618]

>
>
> At the 1994 annual awards dinner given for Forensic Science, (AAFS)
> President, Dr. Don Harper Mills astounded his audience with the legal
> complications of a bizarre death. Here is the story:
>
> On March 23,1994, the medical examiner viewed the body of Ronald Opus
> and concluded that he died from a shotgun wound to the head. Mr. Opus
> had jumped from the top of a ten-story building intending to commit suicide.
>
> He left a note to the effect indicating his despondency. As he fell past
> the ninth floor, his life was interrupted by a shotgun blast passing
> through a window, which killed him instantly.
>
> Neither the shooter nor the deceased was aware that a safety net had
> been installed just below the eighth floor level to protect some
> building workers and that Ronald Opus would not have been able to
> complete his suicide the way he had planned.
>
> The room on the ninth floor, where the shotgun blast emanated, was
> occupied by an elderly man and his wife. They were arguing vigorously
> and he was threatening her with a shotgun! The man was so upset that
> when he pulled the trigger, he completely missed his wife, and the
> pellets went through the window, striking Mr. Opus.
>
> When one intends to kill subject 'A' but kills subject 'B' in the
> attempt, one is guilty of the murder of subject 'B.'
>
> When confronted with the murder charge, the old man and his wife were
> both adamant, and both said that they thought the shotgun was not
> loaded. The old man said it was a long-standing habit to threaten his
> wife with the unloaded shotgun. He had no intention to murder her.
> Therefore the killing of Mr. Opus appeared to be an accident; that is,
> assuming the gun had been accidentally loaded.
>
> The continuing investigation turned up a witness who saw the old
> couple's son loading the shotgun about six weeks prior to the fatal
> accident... It transpired that the old lady had cut off her son's
> financial support and the son, knowing the propensity of his father to
> use the shotgun threateningly, loaded the gun with the expectation that
> his father would shoot his mother...
>
> Since the loader of the gun was aware of this, he was guilty of the
> murder even though he didn't actually pull the trigger. The case now
> becomes one of murder on the part of the son for the death of Ronald Opus.
>
> Now comes the exquisite twist....
>
> Further investigation revealed that the son was, in fact, Ronald Opus.
> He had become increasingly despondent over the failure of his attempt to
> engineer his mother's murder. This led him to jump off the ten-story
> building on March 23rd, only to be killed by a shotgun blast passing
> through the ninth story window.
> The son, Ronald Opus, had actually murdered himself. So the medical
> examiner closed the case as a suicide.
>
> A true story from Associated Press.

[MonBK]

Wow.

[mitchy]

Cooh

[Art 1]

ok.

[FeelingTheBlues]

This is unbelievable...

[Rolex Junky]

I'm flabbergasted.

[GradyPhilpott]

This is an urban legend that was used in the film "Magnolia," although the legend had been around some time before the film.

http://www.snopes.com/horrors/freakish/opus.asp