On March 23, 1994 a medical officer examined the body
of Ronald Opus.

He concluded that Mr Opus had died as a result of a
shotgun wound to
the
head.

Mr Opus had jumped from the top of a ten strory
building intending to
commit
suicide. He had left a note to the effect indicating
his despondency.

As he fell past the ninth floor his life was
interrupted by a shotgun
blast
passing through a window, which killed him instantly.

Neither the shooter nor the the deceased was aware
that a safety net
had
been installed just below the eighth floor level to
protect some
building
workers and that Ronald Opus would not have been able
to complete his
suicide the way he had planned.

Orinarily a person who sets out to commit suicide and
ultimately
succeeds,
even though the mechanism might not be what he
intended, is still
defined as
committing suicide.

The fact that Mr Opus was shot on the way to certain
death, but
probably
would not have been successful because of the safety
net, caused the
medical
examiner to feel that he had a homicide on his hands.

In the room on the ninth floor, where the shotgun
blast eminated, was
occupied by an elderly couple.

They were arguing vigorously and the husband was
threatening the wife
with a
shotgun. The husband was so upset that when he pulled
the trigger he
missed
his wife and the pellets went through the window
striking Mr Opus in
the
head, on his way down.

When one intends to kill a subject "A" but kills
subject "B' by mistake
one
is guilty of murder of subject "B"

When confronted with the charge of murder the old man
and his wife were
adamant and both said that they thought the gun was
unloaded.

The old man explained that it was a long-standing
habit to threaten his
wife
with an un-loaded shotgun during the course of their
arguments. He had
no
intention to murder her.

Therefore the killing of Mr Opus appeared to be an
unfortunate
accident;
that is, if the gun had been accidently loaded.

The continuing investigation turned up a witness who
saw the old
couple's
son loading the shotgun about six weeks prior to the
argument and fatal
shooting.

It transpired that the old lady had cut off her son's
financial support
and
the son, knowing the ponpensity of his father to use
the shotgun
threateningly, loaded the gun with the expectation
that his Father
would
shoot his Mother.

Since the loader of the gun, was aware of this, he was
guilty of murder
even
though he didn't actually pull the trigger.

The case now becomes one of murder on the part of the
son for the death
of
Ronald Opus.

Now comes the exquisit twist.

Further investigations revealed that the son was in
fact, Ronald Opus.

He had become increasingly despondent over the failure
of his attempt
to
engineer his Mother's murder on March 23rd 1994 he
went to the the top
of
the ten story building and jumped off, only to be
killed by a shotgun
blast
through the ninth story window.

The son had actually murdered himself.