A couple weeks ago I went to see Dr. Gary Telgenhoff, the forensic liaison for the popular television show "CSI: Crime Scene Investigation," who spoke in the Reilly Room. Since I am an avid fan of the show, I immediately decided to take advantage of this opportunity.

“Dr. T” is an actual medical examiner from Clark County, Nev., and often meets with writers and cast members from the show to discuss procedures that are commonly carried out on the show, such as autopsies.

Dr. T first discussed how he came to be on the show (he is friends with creator Anthony Zuiker), and then showed us who he works with on "CSI." It was interesting to see pictures of Dr. T with the "CSI" cast members, and other members of the audience were also entertained by seeing their favorite actors from the show. One girl eagerly exclaimed, “Grissom!” when a photograph of Dr. T with William Petersen (who plays lead CSI Gil Grissom) was shown.

Dr. Telgenhoff then showed us what is required to become a forensic pathologist. Back in high school, I had been interested in pursuing a career in forensics. However, although I decided on pharmacy in the end, I still harbor an interest in the subject. I found out that along with four years of college, becoming a forensic pathologist also requires medical school and residencies, amounting to a much longer time than would take to obtain a doctorate in pharmacy.

The part of the presentation that intrigued me the most was the actual autopsy photos and the mysteries behind them. Rather than the fake reenactments of dead bodies seen on "CSI," these were genuine photos from cases Dr. T worked on himself throughout his career. The cases varied from the man who tried to hang himself from an overpass but ended up decapitating himself with metal wire to the woman found decomposing in a trash can in a storage locker. Dr. T also explained that a dead body may tell a different tale than what it says on a first glimpse.

For example, I saw photos of a man who died from exsanguination (loss of all the blood in the body) due to multiple stab wounds, one of which had even caused his intestines to spill from his body. I immediately thought that the man was simply a murder victim, but Dr. T told us to look at his hands, which were clean and had no defensive wounds. Because of the absence of defensive wounds, Dr. T concluded that the man had killed himself. I was very surprised to find this out, given the violence of the crime scene.

One would expect a guest speaker such as Dr. T to have a large audience, given the popularity of "CSI" and the trends of previous speakers to have filled rooms. However, I was surprised to find a crowd of only about 30 people there. I found this presentation to be one of the best that I have attended all year, yet it had the lowest attendance of all of them. I urge other students to take advantage of these guest speakers — they provide a break from homework yet you learn a lot from them!