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Are you sure he was dead?

Reported in the Massachusetts Bar Association Lawyer’s Journal, the following are questions actually asked by an attorney during a trial, along with the insightful answer of the witness.

Q: “Doctor, before you performed the autopsy, did you check for a pulse?”
A: “No.”
Q: “Did you check for blood pressure?”
A: “No.”
Q: “Did you check for breathing?”
A: “No.”
Q: “So, then it is possible that the patient was alive when you began the autopsy?”
A: “No.”
Q: “How can you be sure, Doctor?”
A: “Because his brain was sitting on my desk in a jar.”
Q: “But could the patient still have been alive nevertheless?”
A: “It is possible that he could have been alive and practicing law somewhere.”

This page was last updated March 10, 1998.