So in my WIP, a murder happens. During the course of the murder, an outlet is shorted. The home is older with cloth wiring, and a nail from a remodel had damaged the old wiring insulation. A culmination of years of exposure to heat from the wiring, and the short, caused the framing to catch fire before the over-sized fuse blew (uh-oh, someone's in trouble for using the wrong fuse). The result: the house burns down, but not before the body is removed. I feel all of the preceding is basically solid. Here's my question: if the investigators rapidly discover the damaged wiring and determine it was a time bomb that would have gone off eventually, how hard would they look for evidence of another crime? Would it be obvious if there is a murder, even one with lots of blood, if the murder scene was in close proximity to the hottest part of the fire?
I'm not sure of your question. Who removed the body? The murderer or the police/fire inspectors? It sounds like you are asking, in the course of investigating the fire, would they detect the evidence of the murder or clues of foul play before concluding the fire occured due to faulty wiring or lack of maintenance? I guess it depends on the amount of DNA evidence at the crime scene and whether the heat would destroy it.
Well, they wouldn't look for evidence of another crime at all unless they had reason to. Like if one of the people who live in the house is missing. Not sure how long it would take to put two and two together, but I would have to imagine they'd want to account for all the residents of the house. That would seem like a standard operating procedure, but say we're talking about a wife who whacked her husband, she could tell the fire fighters/investigators "don't worry, I talked to him and he's safe at work." Whether they would dig deeper, who knows? But at some point the missing person report will surface.
Not all murders release blood. Assuming this murder did, if the murder took place near the hottest part of the fire and the house burns down, the blood evidence will be gone. If there is anything suspicious about the fire, they'll bring in an arson investigator. As it happens, I know one of the chief arson investigators in my state's State Police. He also teaches arson investigation to municipal fire marshals, and I have sat through more than one of his classes on [arson] crime scene investigation. They are focused on finding the point of origin of the fire, and the cause. If they bring in a dog (which is likely), it will be a dog trained to sniff out accelerants, not cadavers. If the house actually burns down -- they don't find the damaged wire, because the framing to which is was fastened won't exist.
My husbands a cop and fireman when need be (in our area, you have to train as an officer, fire,and EMT and pass the certifications for all 3). He says if there is evidence of another crime, you investigate it. If theres blood (or anything suspicious) in the ruins, you investigate it. It might not be clear its a murder at the time they are investigating, but they HAVE to look into things if evidence is there
Absolutely. They have to investigate ... if evidence is there. But, if the body has been removed, and the house burned down, there will be no evidence. If there's a suspicion of arson, they'll bring in a canine trailed to sniff accelerants. Those dogs are not trained to sniff blood or cadavers. So, at most, they'll be investigating a possible arson, but not a murder. I've been in buildings that didn't even burn to the ground. Any blood stains or blood spatter anywhere near the hottest part of the fire would have been turned to ashes and cinders.
Probably be an autopsy, if there is no soot in the lungs they may investigate further. I remember an investigation into a fire as the body was found in the basement, then they figured out as the floor gave away it dropped through the floor. But then they found the gunshot wound.
