Dr. G: Medical Examiner - Season 2, Episode 7 - The Things Men Do - Full Episode | Forensic Files

[MUSIC PLAYING] NARRATOR: A body is discovered after a rollover wreck with hardly a scratch on it.
Amazingly, for a guy that's been rolling around inside a pickup truck, he's got very little external trauma.
NARRATOR: Even stranger is what Dr. G finds inside. Death was knocking on this man's door.
NARRATOR: Then, three men start a desert crossing. One doesn't make it to the finish.
He's dead right there and he's only 20. 20-year-olds shouldn't die. NARRATOR: A tragedy that transcends age and nationality,
revealed by Dr. G's autopsy. When you're naked and on my slab, I can't tell what your status in life is.
We're gonna need to find out why you died. NARRATOR: Plus, how Dr. G's investigators
analyze a crime scene. I need my investigator to be my eyes and ears. NARRATOR: Altered lives, baffling medical mysteries,
shocking revelations. These are the everyday cases of Dr. G, Medical Examiner. It's Saturday morning, a day when
most people are just beginning to wind down for the weekend. But in the morgue, business is picking up.
Well, it's typical Saturday morning fare for me, coming in on the weekend, having auto accidents.
NARRATOR: This morning's challenge is a young man found in the cab of his pickup truck
off the interstate. On the police report, it looks like a routine case of death behind the wheel.
But as the morgue team well knows, looks can be deceiving. The night before, around 3 AM, a deputy is out on the graveyard
patrol in central Texas. He passes a long trail of twisted metal and broken glass.
At the end of it, an upended truck. He immediately calls for backup. Trooper Aurelia Hernandez responds.
When I arrived at the scene, I saw a white and colored pickup overturned on its rooftop in the bar ditch
and there was a male subject in the pickup. NARRATOR: The man appears to be dead at the scene.
But the proper authority must make it official. In this jurisdiction, a Justice of the Peace
makes the declaration. If they make it to the hospital, the hospital-- the doctors will determine the cause of death.
But out in the field, like there on the highway, so we have to determine. We do get called out.
NARRATOR: It's a tough outing for Justice Ortiz. The victim, 24-year-old Luis Rey,
is not just another statistic. I knew the deceased, when he was young, a young--
a young kid. You know, he used to hang around with my kids. In this little town like this, everyone knows everyone.
And sometimes, it's sad. You know, it happens a lot. NARRATOR: The local kid grew up to be a father, with three
children of his own, and landed a well-paying job in manufacturing. Now, at the scene of his death, the trooper is frustrated
in her search for clues. It was difficult to make an investigation at the time, because it was dark.
But I gathered as much information as I could. NARRATOR: Dr. G's in the dark too.
Anything could have happened to the young father, from being run off the road to falling
asleep behind the wheel. She'll now have to see what she can discover with nothing more
than the body of the victim. So we've got a 24-year-old in a pickup truck. I need to know why did he leave the roadway?
Did he fall asleep? And then, what kind of trauma caused his death? This is really sad.
NARRATOR: Dr. G's mission, as always, is to find the precise cause of death, which is often surprising, even in a garden variety car wreck.
One thing she knows for sure, about 40% of all car fatalities are alcohol-related.
24-year-old man on Friday night leaving the roadway, single vehicle accident, that's usually alcohol.
But I-- you know, I keep an open opinion. I am looking for other things. NARRATOR: From police reports, Dr. G
learns that Luis was driving about 65 miles per hour and was not wearing a seat belt. This
is the perfect prescription for massive external trauma. There's a lot of injuries that occur with those rollovers
when you're not seat belted in. And they're usually pretty severe. He's gonna have multiple injuries.
I think there-- he's gonna have several reasons to have died. NARRATOR: First, she catalogs the trauma by conducting
a full external exam. A lot of our time and energy goes into traffic accidents, just documenting the injuries.
1, 2, 3, 4, 5. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. He has a little abrasion on the left forehead, a little contusion or a bruise on his cheek,
little-- little mark on his nose, linear, superficial lacerations on his back with some glass embedded up there.
NARRATOR: She also notices extensive red spotting on his face and chest, a phenomenon
called a petechiae. They're basically burst little capillaries, either in the skin
or the delicate membranes of the inner aspect of the eyes. Just little-- little tiny hemorrhages.
NARRATOR: Petechiae are the result of a massive increase in blood pressure when stress is applied to the chest or neck.
Dozens or hundreds of tiny blood vessels burst, leaving red pinhole marks on the surface of the skin.
People think, when they read a little bit about forensic, oh, if you have petechiae, little burst
blood vessels in your eyelids, you must've been strangled. And it doesn't always mean that.
It's a mechanism that you can get with anything. Like heart failure, we see it, because of the heart
not pumping enough blood out. So the pressure's built up. I don't necessarily know the significance of that petechiae,
until I finish the autopsy. NARRATOR: By the end of the external exam, Dr. G has inventoried what amounts
to a collection of minor nicks and cuts, none of which could have been fatal. Amazingly, for a guy that's been rolling around
inside a pickup truck, going 65 miles an hour, he's gotten very little external trauma.
We-- we're really seeing very minor stuff. NARRATOR: This makes her wonder just what she'll find on the inside.
DR. G (VOICEOVER): I've been fooled before. I mean, certainly, you know, I get a lot of accidents with a little external trauma
and then massive internal trauma. I was pretty sure there'd still be some pretty horrific things
internally. NARRATOR: Coming up next, horrific things indeed. Oh my god. NARRATOR: But nothing like what Dr. G expected.
He's got kidney cancer. He's got an adrenal renal cell carcinoma of his kidney. NARRATOR: When "Dr. G, Medical Examiner" continues.
It's the morning after another fatal Friday night in Dr. G's morgue. She performs the standard Y incision
on a late night traffic victim. 24-year-old Luis Ray had died in a rollover accident, in which
he had not been wearing a seat belt. But strangely, the body shows few signs of external trauma.
Sometimes I see horrific things with auto accidents. I mean, the-- the scalp off and the brains coming out.
I mean, it's really obviously, as soon as you see a person, why they died. NARRATOR: Now, more technicians draw blood, urine, and eye
fluid for toxicology testing. As she prepares to open the rib cage, Dr. G expects the worst.
This will be interesting. I'm expecting some significant internal injuries, particularly
since he's dead at the scene. I expect upper abdominal trauma, some lacerated liver, lot
of blood collecting in the abdominal cavity, a lot of broken ribs, possibly punctured lungs, and maybe
some trauma to the heart. NARRATOR: But when she finishes opening the chest, she finds nothing of the kind.
DR. G (VOICEOVER): Well, first thing I notice when I open him up is there's no blood anywhere.
And there's no blood in any of his pleural cavities where his lungs sit. There's no blood around his heart.
All his organs look pretty good. NARRATOR: The man doesn't have so much as a cracked rib.
So far, there is not a shred of evidence as to what killed Luis Ray. I'm a bit surprised there's no trauma, really none at all,
internally. I am a bit surprised. So far, nothing. Still a mystery. NARRATOR: There's one last likely place to check, the part
of the body most likely to sustain deadly injury in a car wreck. So we're ruling out the chest and abdominal.
Well, he doesn't have chest and abdomen. So it's probably has head. I've seen cases where they roll many times,
they're fine below the neck. And then, they've got severe head injuries or upper neck injury.
Maybe the brain got jostled inside the skull and we have closed head injuries. I get my assistant to open the skull.
And we take-- and I take the skull cap off. And there is no trauma. NARRATOR: Dr. G now faces a conundrum.
A man is found dead in a truck after a high speed rollover accident, but inexplicably he
seems to be unscathed. DR. G (VOICEOVER): So now, we've got some problems, because I am left with no chest hemorrhage,
no neck hemorrhage, no abdominal hemorrhage, and no head trauma. So no trauma anywhere in this man.
So what happened to him? NARRATOR: The State Highway Patrol has waited for daylight to complete
their own investigation. I went back out the next day to see if I had missed anything.
NARRATOR: There should be evidence at the scene if there was another vehicle involved
or some form of foul play. But what bothers the trooper is what she doesn't find.
There were no additional car parts to suggest a collision with another vehicle. Nor is there rubber on the road, the usual sign of braking
or swerving to avoid an accident. There was no skid marks on the roadway. The subject never took evasive action.
NARRATOR: The officer offers her own working theory. I concluded that the subject fell asleep at the wheel
and he never braked to avoid, you know, going onto the bar ditch. NARRATOR: But Dr. G has her own ideas.
Without the braking, it tells me that there's something wrong with him that caused
this accident, whether he fell asleep or he was intoxicated or he had some natural disease.
NARRATOR: Dr. G now has to consider the possibility that Luis Rey died of natural causes
and even that he could've been dead before the truck left the road. There's a lot of really weird, out there kind
of things that could happen. I just need to do the autopsy to find out. NARRATOR: She recalls that among the laundry
list of superficial wounds was a cut on the forehead. And beneath it, a hematoma.
When I saw the hematoma, or collection of blood in his scalp, I knew at least his heart
was pumping during the accident, that he wasn't dead prior to the accident. NARRATOR: That is he wasn't dead yet.
But could an underlying condition have triggered the accident and been the ultimate cause of death?
The autopsy continues with Dr. G examining and measuring the organs, one of which is in a shocking state.
That's interesting. NARRATOR: On his left kidney is a sizable tumor, one that a young man shouldn't have.
He's got kidney cancer. He's got adrenal cell carcinoma of his kidney. And it was about two inches, about 5 centimeters, in size.
That's very unusual for a 24-year-old. That's a cancer that you see, well, typically, in men,
50, 60, 70-year-old men. NARRATOR: But kidney cancer is generally a slow killer.
And Luis had died suddenly. Based on the progression of the disease, Dr. G rules out the condition as a possible cause
of the accident. There's probably not a good reason for him to become unconscious because of that.
NARRATOR: The next organ she checks reveals an even bigger surprise. This is a huge heart.
He has a tremendously enlarged heart, very thickened wall. This is [INAUDIBLE]. It looks like a cardiomyopathy.
It's a disease of the muscle of the heart, usually-- probably genetic. NARRATOR: The full name of the condition
is hypertrophic cardiomyopathy. Normally, the walls of the heart are thin and pliable.
But the muscles surrounding Luis' left ventricle is abnormally thick, often reducing the volume of blood
ejected with each contraction. It's a defect that places him at risk of severe cardiac arrhythmia and cardiac arrest.
During a spell of arrhythmia, the heart can beat dangerously slow, fast, or a combination of both.
Eventually, you can die suddenly from it. You shouldn't have a heart that weighs 630 grams.
And it shouldn't have that left ventricle as thick as-- almost 2 centimeters thick.
And so he definitely has some problems. NARRATOR: Was it a heart attack and not a highway wreck that put this young man in the morgue?
Coming up next, Dr. G confirms that Luis Ray was a medical time bomb bound down accident alley.
Which disease, if any, got to him first? This guy was running away from the grim reaper,
because one of those was eventually gonna get him. NARRATOR: When "Dr. G, Medical Examiner" continues.
Tox is here. I'll be right back. Hey, Rhonda. NARRATOR: At 9 AM, the toxicology report of 24-year-old Luis Ray arrives at the morgue.
With the autopsy complete, Dr. G has surprisingly found none of the major trauma typically
associated with a violent rollover auto accident. Now, she's trying to determine which
of Luis' growing list of natural ailments might have ultimately taken his life? Perhaps the toxicology report will
confirm everyone's original hypothesis and solve the mystery. Thought she would find that the subject
had been consuming alcohol at the time of the accident. NARRATOR: Dr. G scans the report for the line item for alcohol.
It reads negative. But for an illegal substance, the reading is positive. It's cocaine.
And unlike alcohol, whose effects depend on its level in the blood, any amount of cocaine
can be toxic. Cocaine is pretty unpredictable. You can die with really low levels.
You could have the same level one week and then that same level the following week could kill you.
NARRATOR: And in the case of Luis Ray, cocaine could be particularly dangerous. I'll tell you, a guy with a big heart,
with a cardiomyopathy, the last thing he needs is cocaine. Because cocaine is arrhythmogenic
in and of itself, meaning it could precipitate heart arrhythmias. The guy's already got a heart that
could have an arrhythmia at any time and he's taking cocaine. It's a shame he didn't notice.
NARRATOR: There is a strong possibility that the cocaine induced an attack of arrhythmia.
But that attack was probably not fatal. I'm gonna be a little suspect that I an-- an arrhythmia--
sudden arrhythmia probably isn't gonna be his cause of death. NARRATOR: Still, even a nonlethal arrhythmia
could've easily caused Luis to lose consciousness behind the wheel. A heart condition aggravated by cocaine use.
Dr. G may have zeroed in on a cause for the accident, though not for the death itself.
But knowing what she knows now, she revisits her autopsy findings. I go back to the very-- one of the very first things I saw,
the petechiae. NARRATOR: Petechiae is the classic symptom that the victim has been choked to death.
In the course of the rollover accident, could Lewis have somehow been strangled?
At the time they brought the body in with my investigative report, they had hinted that his body
was in a strange position. I really had to reconfirm that. NARRATOR: Unfortunately, there are
no photographs of the wreck. I would've liked a picture. I would've liked to have been there to see it.
It's not a perfect world. I have to take the word of the first responding officer.
NARRATOR: Fortunately, the trooper was very clear on this detail in her final report.
The memorable aspect of this case was actually the position of the subject, because I had never worked an accident
involving a subject coming to rest in that position. DR. G (VOICEOVER): His body was very contorted.
His face was pressed up against a seat. Working with the police findings to recreate the exact position
of the body in the overturned trunk, Dr. G finally hits on a potential killer. It's something called positional asphyxia.
Positional is the position of your body. And asphyxia means you're not getting enough oxygen.
And you're not getting enough oxygen, because your body is in a position that it can't breathe, whether it's trapped
and the chest can't expand or it's blocking your nose and mouth. In this case, I think it's a combination.
NARRATOR: Dr. G's ruling on the ultimate cause of death, a form of suffocation called positional asphyxia.
Now, she can see how a deadly succession of natural disease, poor choices, and a twist of fate
led directly to Luis Ray's tragic end on a lonely stretch of Texas highway. Luis used cocaine sometime before climbing into his truck
and driving home. He is unaware that he suffers from a congenital heart condition called hypertrophic cardiomyopathy.
The drug helps to trigger the onset of cardiac arrhythmia. DR. G (VOICEOVER): His heart starts
going into abnormal beat, maybe beating too fast. It's not enough to kill him, but it's
enough to maybe temporarily cause the blood pressure to go down. He doesn't get enough blood to his brain
and he maybe passes out. NARRATOR: Pilotless, the truck drifts across the highway
and over the shoulder, until he jumps a block of cement. It went airborne, completely flipped.
And those pickups were pretty-- pretty good such trucks. And he landed on his roof, upside down.
And he kind of skidded for about, I'd say, 50 to 80 yards from when he hit. NARRATOR: Although he's not buckled in,
Luis miraculously survived the crash with no more than a few scratches. So far, his luck has been extraordinary,
but it's about to run out. He's still unconscious and contorted in a position in which his airway was closed
and his chest constricted from being able to inflate. He couldn't get enough oxygen, because he
no longer could breathe. He couldn't expand his chest or get oxygen from the position of his mouth.
And he couldn't move, because he was entrapped in there. He dies from that lack of oxygen in that he can't breathe,
because of the position of his body. NARRATOR: Every Saturday in a big city morgue
brings another round of traffic fatalities from the night before. The sheer volume would be numbing, if it were
not for the attendant tragedy. But death is never strictly routine, as in the mysterious, multi-layered case of Luis Rey.
Death was knocking on this man's door with his heart, with him using cocaine with his heart,
with his tumor that was gonna get him. I mean, the poor guy. The fact that he's only 24 and he's already
got a cancer in his kidneys, he's got a horrible cardiomyopathy, he's taking cocaine,
the only thing this man avoided was bad internal injuries. And then, he gets crushed by his truck.
I mean, this guy was running away from the grim reaper, because one of those was eventually gonna get him.
NARRATOR: Coming up next, Dr. G investigates the death of a young man found dead in the Texan desert.
We did get a lot of drug-related deaths out of Webb County. And they usually have 15 bullet holes in them.
NARRATOR: When "Dr. G, Medical Examiner" continues. In Dr. G's morgue, autopsy is biography.
So stab wound. So we got autopsy on that. NARRATOR: Each body tells an intriguing story
of a life fully lived or tragically cut short, of the famous or the unknown. But they don't use drugs.
NARRATOR: This is one place where everyone gets the A-list treatment. DR. G (VOICEOVER): When you're naked and on my slab,
I can't tell what your status in life was. I don't care what your nationality is.
If you have died in the jurisdiction that I cover for, we-- we're gonna need to find out why you died.
We-- we're gonna need to find out that foul play did not come your way. NARRATOR: In the sun-drenched badlands
of Texas, near the Mexican border, three young men are on foot. This area sees more than its share of untimely death.
Indeed, one of the three will not reach their destination alive. The following day, a ranch hand is driving down
a lonely stretch of Highway 44. Suddenly, two men break through the brush and wave him over.
They tell the driver that they have a friend in distress and lead the man to a nearby deer hunter's blind.
Inside, he makes a grim discovery, the decaying body of a young man. As he calls 911, the two men flee into the surrounding bush.
Presumably, they have something to hide from the authorities. But there is now no one to tell who this man is or how he died,
questions that will now have to be somehow answered in the San Antonio morgue of Dr. G.
DR. G (VOICEOVER): Got a 20-year-old gentleman that was found in a deer blind. He's coming in from a rural county,
Webb County, which is where Laredo is, which is on the border of Mexico. We don't know exactly why he's in a deer blind.
Got a bag for you to check out here. NARRATOR: In the victim's knapsack, police find a bag of pills identified as dipyrone.
A Mexican-made pain medication, dipyrone is banned in the United States. Its use has been linked to sometimes
fatal health complications. Other than the pills, there isn't much to go on. His only possessions are pretty much
the clothes on his back and a little bag of cookies and a wallet in his back pocket with an ID
from Mexico. NARRATOR: The identification card gives a name and an age. Benedicto Ramos was just 20 years old.
The hardest part of these, actually, is trying to get next of kin. Somebody knows him.
Somebody's got to let his loved ones know that he's dead. NARRATOR: One fact is certain, the location where the body was
found, Webb County, one of the harshest, most dangerous counties in Texas north of the Mexican border.
We have a case coming in from Webb County, you're like, oh. You cringe. NARRATOR: This is a region funded by so-called mules
and coyotes, those who transport drugs and illegal immigrants over the border. We did get a lot of drug-related
deaths out of Webb County. And they usually have 15 bullet holes in them. You don't get shot once in Webb County.
You get shot 20 times. NARRATOR: But this doesn't have the usual look of a drug-related death.
DR. G (VOICEOVER): A guy using drugs, a guy running drugs, doesn't carry a bag of cookies with him.
Doesn't-- doesn't mark the soles of his tennis shoes black so people can't see him at night.
NARRATOR: Dr. G's formal examination now begins. As always, she first looks for signs of external trauma.
He is a slight man, 5 foot, 7, 145 pounds. And he's starting to decompose. He's starting to get a little bit bloated and a little bit
of skin discoloration. NARRATOR: The decayed condition of the body makes for a more difficult examination,
also, an unpleasant one. I don't mind the smell at all. But I don't like to smell like the guy.
And I have hairspray on my hair, believe it or not. And I-- it'll really stick. So I don't want to smell like him.
So we're gonna try to cover up, so that it doesn't smell as bad-- for me, so I don't smell as bad.
NARRATOR: As the body begins to decompose, the internal buildup of gases causes the body to swell.
Chemicals are released, which turn the skin a blue-green color. And parasites are starting to consume the tissues.
DR. G (VOICEOVER): He was just early, like, insect activity, little maggots on his neck,
starting to get some greenish discoloration. Still could see the skin quite well.
Very tense, firm skin. That's what you see from the bloating. That gas has formed from the bacteria in the body
and start bloating it. NARRATOR: The challenge for Dr. G is to look past the distortion caused by the decomposition
while checking it for wounds or other signs of a violent demise. No indication that he's strangled.
His neck looks pretty good. I don't see any trauma to the anterior neck. OK. This is [INAUDIBLE].
So we don't really see-- I don't see any trauma on him. NARRATOR: The external exam seems
to rule out death by strangulation, shooting, or other related injuries. But sometimes, signs of foul play
can only be discovered during the internal exam. So we're gonna have to look internal,
look on the inside for trauma. NARRATOR: Did the elicit dipyrone pills found in his body cause his death?
Or was there some other danger that befell Benedicto Ramos in the Texas rangeland, that his two companions somehow escaped?
Even though he's relatively young, from what we can tell, you know, we-- there are things that can happen to you out there.
Get an infection or just even have some kind of inherent heart disease. NARRATOR: Coming up next, the autopsy reveals
what happened to Benedicto. Something that shouldn't have happened to someone of his age.
He's dead right there and he's only 20. 20-year-olds shouldn't die. NARRATOR: When "Dr. G, Medical Examiner" continues.
Like a blurred photograph, a partly decomposed body lies in Dr. G's morgue. She's looking past the effects of decay
to bring the man's moment of death into sharp focus. Very green. NARRATOR: The remains of 20-year-old Benedicto Ramos
were recovered from a hunter's blind near the Mexican border. It's an area known for drug trafficking and
illegal immigrant crossings. Will opening up the body reveal the elusive cause of death?
The usual Y incision to expose the internal organs brings a blast of noxious air.
I was opening him and a rush of gas came out. Could you hold this up for me, Dave?
He's got some decomp fluid in his pleural cavities. But pretty much everything else is intact, just a little
softer than I'd normally see. NARRATOR: Each organ is removed and carefully weighed,
cross-sectioned, and evaluated. DR. G (VOICEOVER): There's just not much you can see.
I don't see evidence of infection. And I don't see any natural disease. NARRATOR: She proceeds to the man's head.
The skull cap is removed. And the brain inside is inspected for possible bruising, bruising which might've
been caused by a possible blow to the head or a fall. There's no trauma on him. Skull's fined.
His brain's very soft, from the decomposition, but no evidence of internal trauma.
NARRATOR: So far, all her tests have come up negative. And Dr. G is positively stumped.
He's dead right there and he's only 20. 20-year-olds shouldn't die. NARRATOR: Her field investigator has, meanwhile,
had better luck. He's managed to track down the man's next of kin in Mexico. The story they tell is a familiar one.
Benedicto Ramos was an otherwise law-abiding young man who chose to enter America illegally.
These are the poor guys coming in for a better life, trying to come under the radar, trying
to escape authorities just because they don't want to be caught and sent back. They just want a job.
They want to live here. NARRATOR: This could explain why the dead man's two companions
vanished before police arrived. They didn't want to be deported as illegal immigrants.
It also helps to account for the pills. Although banned in the US, dipyrone is a legal pain
medication in Mexico. And according to the toxicology report, levels found in his blood were not lethal.
Having ruled out foul play, trauma, drugs, and natural disease, Dr. G is left with few alternatives.
But given Benedicto's long journey on foot in the Texas sun, she now has a hunch what it is.
Just the-- the process of being out there in the heat, trying to get a-- you know, trying to walk.
He either died from heat stroke or dehydration or a combination of both. NARRATOR: Dehydration is severe fluid loss
through sweating and urination. If the water is not replenished, sodium and potassium
rise to toxic levels, resulting in cramping, nausea, debilitating headaches, and, finally, coma.
But death by dehydration is one of the hardest things to prove during autopsy, because there
is usually little fluid left in the body for testing purposes. DR. G: The aorta, pulmonary artery, [INAUDIBLE],,
they're all just filled with air. I can't get any blood. On a live person, they can easily draw blood and check
for the sodium, check for the blood urea nitrogen that go-- that can go up with dehydration.
I can't do that in somebody who's dead, particularly somebody who's starting to decompose.
NARRATOR: Her only resort is to examine the bladder. Normally, the organ would have some trace of fluid.
But when she looks inside, she finds it bone dry. This negative finding is key in Dr. G's investigation.
His bladder is empty, then he's probably running out of water. We can kind of put it together.
It's probably dehydration in this case, because of the temperature of when he's crossing
and the fact is that he's got no urine. NARRATOR: Dr. G is now confident enough in the evidence
to make a ruling. And the story of the last days of Benedicto Ramos can finally be replayed.
Benedicto and his two compadres are among the thousands of poor Mexicans lured northward by the prosperity
of the United States. Slipping across the border had been relatively easy. Getting across the unforgiving frontier on foot,
that was very dangerous, even for a young man in good health. They're coming across the river
and then they're having to walk through these-- through these ranches. And these ranches are just hundreds
and thousands of acres. That rural area right along the border that they got to get across, it doesn't
take long to get dehydrated. NARRATOR: Every hour that Benedicto hikes in the triple digit heat, he sweats off 1 to 2 quarts
of fluid. All three men are dehydrated. But Benedicto is the first to experience
full blown symptoms, excessive thirst, dizziness, nausea. As Benedicto loses strength, the three men
come across a deer blind, the only shelter for many miles. And they thought that would be a good place to sleep probably.
I mean, it sounds good to me. Probably helped them up there thinking, if he just rested,
he'd be OK. NARRATOR: But what seems to be a deep sleep is actually a coma. The little remaining fluid in his body
is being diverted to his most vital organs. By the time the other two men wake, Benedicto is dead.
[INTERPOSING VOICES] They flag down a truck to let somebody know what happened, a last act of kindness for their compadre.
They have some compassion that their buddy's dead and nobody's gonna find out for a long time.
NARRATOR: This one victim is a voice for many more. In the year 2004, there were 330 deaths
from exposure in the borderlands, despite government efforts to dissuade people from the deadly crossing.
I have the labels. NARRATOR: Dr. G's morgue is remote from the inner workings of government agencies.
What she sees are the personal tragedies, the people like Benedicto Ramos. DR. G (VOICEOVER): Is there some way
we can get these guys either not to come across or to help them come across? But letting them just individually die like this,
it's just really sad. And it seems like we can come up with some way to prevent this.
NARRATOR: Coming up next, see what it's like to be one of Dr. G's medical investigators.
Always wash your hands when you get back with a body. NARRATOR: When "Dr. G, Medical Examiner" continues.
In Orlando, Florida, when a person dies and the death is under the jurisdiction of the District Nine
medical examiner's office, the first person dispatched to the scene is the death investigator.
Got a black male, probably been dead about three or four days. NARRATOR: But their work is unlike any TV
drama would portray it. He is a big dork. NARRATOR: It's strenuous, tedious, and can be very unpleasant.
Do I smell Vicks? You little wussies. NARRATOR: These are the men, and woman, who makeup Dr. G's
team of Death Investigators. In the District Nine morgue, there are eight full time investigators.
Each year, they're involved in at least half of the 6,000 cases that are handled by the morgue,
about four to five bodies a day. Just want to let you know, PD's working a 64-year-old white male.
85-year-old woman that lives by herself in a trailer. Medical investigators are key to the practice
of forensic pathology. You have to have somebody else to be helping you. I need my investigator to be my eyes and ears,
take pictures, and follow up on the information I need. STEVE HANSON (VOICEOVER): They tell the newspaper people,
you've got to look for the who, what, when, where, how, and why. It's the same thing that we're doing.
We're trying to get that information. NARRATOR: An investigator's number one priority
is to investigate the surroundings and circumstances of the fatality. Get out to the scene and first thing
we'll do is check in with the law enforcement official, be it the patrol officer or the sergeant or the detective.
They'll be able to tell us what the circumstances were, how the body was discovered.
With most medical examiner's office, the scene is the jurisdiction of the police.
But the body is our jurisdiction. They cannot touch the body. They cannot move the body.
And so they will go there, get the information of what is known by the police. And then, we can then examine the body and look for what
kind of trauma there is. There's no trauma. He got out of the hospital a month ago.
The manager's the one that called LPD? Yeah. DR. G (VOICEOVER): All that information has to be gathered.
Because that helps me figure out why he died. NARRATOR: An investigator will also record the time of death,
if known, the temperature of the body and air, as well as the weather. What they will not do, however, is use any lasers.
Remember, you're talking about two different things now. We're not CSI. We're the medical examiner's office.
I guess if we wanted to point to something, we could use a laser. But we haven't done that yet.
NARRATOR: Before the body is moved or touched in any way, an investigator must extensively photograph the body
and its location from multiple angles and distances to create a permanent visual record of the death scene.
STEVE HANSON (VOICEOVER): What was around the body? How was the body involved with the scene itself?
Are there factors at the scene that influenced the-- the death? Are there factors that could've been responsible
for some of the pattern injuries that you're seeing on the body? NARRATOR: An investigator may take
up to 20 pictures at a scene. And most investigators now use digital cameras. Photos are key.
If I've not-- I don't have time-- if I have six bodies in a day, I can't go to six scenes.
And I don't know, oftentimes, how important things are at the scene until I see the body
and I-- and I examine the body. Seven days a week, 24 hours a day. Somebody's got to take that call.
We can't wait til business hours to go pick up a body and figure out what happened.
Investigations. Jack speaking. NARRATOR: But sometimes no matter how much training or experience, the most difficult challenge
facing the medical investigator can simply be picking up the phone. The child is in the backseat?
Been there all day? Thank you, kind sir. STEVE HANSON (VOICEOVER): You see this stuff on TV
and you read about it in books and we deal with it on a daily basis. And obviously, I've been doing this for a long time,
as well as a lot of the other investigators in our office. We've learned how to deal with it.
But it's-- it still takes a toll on you.

It is 3am and Deputy Torres is cruising a Texas highway when he suddenly spots a crushed pick-up truck along the side of the road. Trapped inside is the lifeless body of 24-year-old Luis Reyes.

A Florida medical examiner takes viewers through puzzling cases while explaining procedures and conclusions.

Brief Summary

Dr. G investigates two tragic deaths: Luis Rey in a rollover accident and Benedicto Ramos found in a deer blind, revealing unexpected causes.

Key points

A Body is Discovered. A rollover wreck reveals a body with hardly a scratch, raising questions.
The Tragic Death of Luis Rey. Luis Rey, a 24-year-old father, is found dead in a truck after a rollover accident.
Unexpected Findings in Autopsy. Dr. G discovers shocking internal conditions in Luis Rey's body, including cancer and heart disease.
Dr. G's Investigation. Dr. G examines the body of Benedicto Ramos to uncover the cause of death.
The Tragic Death of Benedicto Ramos. Benedicto Ramos, a 20-year-old, dies from dehydration while crossing the Texas border.

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

20-year-olds shouldn’t die.

0:43WatchMay 25, 2021

Tension

75/ 100High tension

More from True Crime Files

Solve the Crime

Read a real case one clue at a time, then see how your call held up against the investigators.