No reason to dispute autopsy findings.
A forensic pathologist appointed by the United Kingdom’s Coroner today concurred with the Malaysian post-mortem report on Nora Anne Quoirin’s cause of death – duodenal ulceration, perforation and haemorrhage as a result of prolonged hunger and stress.
In his six-page witness statement, Dr Nathaniel Roger Blair Cary, 63, said based on his own examination of the teenager’s body in the UK on August 28 last year, and on the findings of his Malaysian counterparts, he also found no sign of sexual assault on the teenager.
“As to the findings on the internal organs, there was no underlying natural disease that caused or contributed to the death,” he said.
However, Cary said he was unable to do more due to the body’s decomposed state, especially when he conducted the examination 15 days after the body was found.
“I have seen the copy of the pathologist report from Malaysia by Dr Siew Sheue Feng and Dr Hanif Mahmud (both forensic pathology experts), that there was thorough examination.
“I was satisfied there was evidence of duodenal ulceration, perforation and haemorrhage on the basis of a detailed description provided.”
Cary, who is the 41st witness at the inquest to determine the cause of the French-Irish teenager’s death, said this when testifying on the 20th day of the proceedings before Coroner Maimoonah Aid.
Proceedings were held online.
He said initially upon examining the teenager’s genitalia, excluding sexual assault was not possible as it was decomposed.
“However, my further examination of the labia majora did not show any evidence of bruising at all and the subcutaneous tissues were well preserved,” he added.
Asked by deputy public prosecutor Ahmad Sazali Omar, who is acting as coordinating officer, whether this finding indicated that there was no positive forensic evidence of sexual assault as stated in the Malaysian post-mortem report, Cary agreed.
“I am unable to exclude it from my examination alone, but if one adopts the Malaysian pathologist report and in my opinion the examination had been very thorough, I agree there is no positive evidence,” he said.
Sazali: If there were an element of foul play, would you have found it on the body of Nora Anne?
Cary: Many types of foul play signs will be apparent in any case, but it seems to me the overriding cause of death was like what was discovered by the Malaysian pathologists, which was intestinal bleeding.
Sazali: I mean a defensive wound from a physical assault.
Cary: My examination was very limited due to the decomposing state of the body, but the first pathologists were in a much better position to give an opinion on that.
Nora Anne, 15, went missing on August 4, a day after she and her family arrived in Malaysia for a two-week holiday at a resort in Pantai.
On August 13, 10 days after she went missing, her body was found near a creek at a ravine, about 2.5km from the resort where she and her family stayed, following a massive search.
The preliminary post-mortem report stated that there was no foul play in the teenager’s death, and she was confirmed dead from gastrointestinal bleeding due to prolonged hunger and stress.
The inquest continues on December 7.