Hiya all, this may be a bit long but I would really appreciate to get some input on how things roll in real life in this situations.
Yesterday we played our second session of the excellent DG adventure "The New Age." At the climax of the session, the players (Agents Sean, Shannon and Sylvia, all FBI, and a friendly DEA agent b the name of Mike Schultz) ambushed a protomatter agent of the bad guys (named Hope) in one of their hotel rooms, and a violent fight ensued. Using incendiary bullets (the PCs have played Convergence and knew about protomatter), the fight ended with the creature dead, one of the PCs almost killed with a fractured leg, lots of bullet holes and several small fires on the room.
At the the end of the fight the situation is like this: there's a SIZ 15 lifeless puddle that was Hope, the protomatter doppleganger, an injured FBI agent (Sean), lots of smoke and bullet holes, and no corpse for the attacker. My players keep a cool head and try to think a plausible cover up, so they call first thing Agent Gaston (an FBI officer who is in charge of the case and who brought them here), tell him what happened, ask him to bring a forensics team and a cannister of liquid nitrogen from the lab, and then proceed to isolate the scene and evacuate the injured PC to a nearby hospital.
Schultz gets Sean to the lobby waving his FBI badge left and right and asks for an ambulance ASAP. Sylvia and Shannon call the Security Head of the hotel (the Saint Louis Hilton, for those who know it) and order him to use their guards to keep guests away from the room (and so, no security staff of the hotel is allowed to see anything inconvenient in the room), while they wait for Gaston and the FBI people to arrive.
Once Gaston arrives with other 3 FBI agents (not DG), they get the forensics gear and start cleaning the room. Gaston orders the non-DG FBI agents to get statements from other guests and hotel staff (so they won't see the puddle that was Hope), while Sylvia and Shannon use the liquid nitrogen on the protomatter to freeze it and allow for an easier handling, then they stuff it on a styrofoam cooler, put the cooler inside a body bag (along with the bedcovers so it will look on passing inspection as a whole body inside a bag), make a fuss about pretending they're processing the scene, and then take the "corpse" to the General Hospital for "autopsy".
OK, so they rendezvous with Schultz (Sean is undergoing surgery on his leg), and, as Shannon is a M.D. coroner, they tell the hospital coroner to fuck off, because she will perform the autopsy. The coroner objects, but some great social rolls and badge waving convince him to go away. Now they have the autopsy room for themselves.
They decide to incinerate the puddle, but we guessed they couldn't just do it like that. So they decided to fabricate a corpse for their "assailant" and put Hope's remains where they would be cremated.
Their plan was to put the fake body bag containing Hope into the container of the corpse of one of the deceased prostitutes from the orgy that started the adventure, fill a fake autopsy report and present her as some Jane Doe that broke into their room, tried to assault them and was killed.
So, Schultz and Sylvia walked to the clerk at the morgue reception, bluffed him to leave his post to be "interrogated about some irregularities at the hospital) while Shannon, who is pretty adept with computers, sneaks to the PC, learns where the corpse of one of the prostitutes is stored (so they can make the change), and make the necessary changes in the system so that corpse will be cremated ASAP. Then she comes back to the autopsy room, Sylvia and Schultz leave the clerk alone, and they all proceed to store Hope' remains on the unit marked for cremation, while Shannon doctors an autopsy so it seems that the Jane Doe that allegdly assaulted them at their room is properly processed.
Now, the question is: is this a believable setup? None of us is familiar with the inner workings of such proceedings, less so in the US (we are Spanish), so we didn't know if what we were doing was possible or not. We understand that bodies on a criminal investigation may never be cremated unless they are a biological hazard, so that is why they set up all that farce.
Now, this morning I realizaed that it would have been easier to hid the remains of the protomatter in the tub, then take them to the Green Box in Saint Louis and stuff them there with a note of DO NOT OPEN THIS EVER. :D
What do you think of our setup?
Dismissing the assigned coroner is probably the weakest link. If there are any irregularities (including him not being able to review the case he was assigned to) he's going to squawk.
He has to go.
Quote from: Brad J. Murray;469237Dismissing the assigned coroner is probably the weakest link. If there are any irregularities (including him not being able to review the case he was assigned to) he's going to squawk.
He has to go.
One of my players at my 7th Sea group is a policewoman, and she told me a very similar thing.
By "he has to go" you mean "he should have a fatal accident"? ;)
First of all, terminology. "Forensics" is any science done for a court. If you're not going to court with it, it's not forensic. It might be pathology, but it's not forensic. Although of course, the characters would be maintaining the fiction that they intended to do a court case out of it, so on that basis they would probably call the work forensic in character.
As to getting the coroner to go away, I can't imagine that as being a problem. Bodies are assigned to different jurisdictional categories all the time. A medical examiner is going to do an autopsy if they are required to do so and not do it if someone else is required to do so. Really, all you have to do is claim that it's part of a federal case and that there is evidence that one or more of the related bodies was a foreign national and the local medical examiner will get the fuck out of the way.
Consider this real event (http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/metropolitan/7431598.html). Medical examiners will jump at any excuse, no matter how flimsy, to get out of work. They might not let you use their room, but they'll be fucking thrilled that you are giving them the day off.
-Frank
Quote from: FrankTrollman;469327First of all, terminology. "Forensics" is any science done for a court. If you're not going to court with it, it's not forensic. It might be pathology, but it's not forensic. Although of course, the characters would be maintaining the fiction that they intended to do a court case out of it, so on that basis they would probably call the work forensic in character.
As to getting the coroner to go away, I can't imagine that as being a problem. Bodies are assigned to different jurisdictional categories all the time. A medical examiner is going to do an autopsy if they are required to do so and not do it if someone else is required to do so. Really, all you have to do is claim that it's part of a federal case and that there is evidence that one or more of the related bodies was a foreign national and the local medical examiner will get the fuck out of the way.
Consider this real event (http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/metropolitan/7431598.html). Medical examiners will jump at any excuse, no matter how flimsy, to get out of work. They might not let you use their room, but they'll be fucking thrilled that you are giving them the day off.
-Frank
Thanks so much, really helpful, specially the press article.
I guess that given that one of the PCs is a forensic doctor herself a la Scully, there would be no problem with her conducting the autopsy herself.