The Journal of the Massachusetts Bar recorded this exchange between an anonymous attorney and a pathologist in a recent murder trial:
"Doctor, before you performed the autopsy, did you check for a pulse?"
"No."
"Did you check for breathing?"
"No."
"So then, is it possible that the patient was alive when you began the autopsy?"
"No."
"How can you be so sure?"
"Because his brain was sitting on my desk in a jar."
Even then, this would-be Perry Mason refused to throw in the towel:
"Is it possible the patient could be alive, nevertheless?"
"It is possible that he could have been alive," said the pathologist, "and practicing the law somewhere."
