Suicide of a body packer

The smuggling of illicit drugs by means of body packing has become a common problem at European airports. Europe is considered to be the fastest growi ng market for cocaine worldwide, and the air route is the most frequently u sed method of trafficking cocaine. Smuggling illicit drugs by use of body p acking is considered to be a high toxicological hazard because of the risk of leakage or a package bursting. We report about the first case of suicide of a body packer by re-ingesting the content of excreted cocaine packages. The consequence of this case is that the death scene investigation and aut opsy assessments in case of a body packer's death should always consider th e possibility of re-ingested packages.:Detention personnel should be instru cted by forensic and criminalistic experts to take preventive measures. (C) 2000 Elsevier Science Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.