I am like 95 percent sure no one who has ever requested an autopsy on a whim for their dead family member knew he was gonna get his ribcage split open with garden shears. Which, by the way, the fucking Atlantic misspelled.Families request autopsies for a number of reasons: They want closure; they want to see what role genetics played in someone’s death and how it might affect them in the future; they feel guilty and wonder if there’s anything they or their doctors could’ve done differently.
“What we have is a combination of surgery implements and common garden tools and kitchen appliances,” Nine says. From inside one of the cabinets he pulls out a pair of green heavy-duty hedge sheers, at least two feet long. They’re used to crack open the rib cage, sometimes in lieu of a bone saw. “We use them like chopping limbs off a tree,” he tells me.