Mr. Specter. Now, had you actually observed the wound prior to the time the tracheotomy was performed on that neck wound?
Dr. McClelland. No; my knowledge of the entrance wound, as I stated, in my former deposition, was merely from what Dr. Perry told me when I entered the room and began putting on a pair of surgical gloves to assist with the tracheotomy.
Dr. Perry looked up briefly and said that they had made an incision and were in the process of making an incision in the neck, which extended through the middle of the wound in question in the front of the neck.
Mr. Specter. Now, you have just characterized it in that last answer as an entrance wound.
Dr. McClelland. Well, perhaps I shouldn't say the wound anyway, not the entrance wound—that might be a slip of the tongue.
Mr. Specter. Do you have a firm opinion at this time as to whether it is an entrance wound or exit wound or whatever?
Dr. McClelland. Of course, my opinion now would be colored by everything that I've heard about it and seen since, but I'll say this, if I were simply looking at the wound again and had seen the wound in its unchanged state, and which I did not, and, of course, as I say, it had already been opened up by the tracheotomy incision when I saw the wound—but if I saw the wound in its state in which Dr. Perry described it to me, I would probably initially think this were an entrance wound, knowing nothing about the circumstances as I did at the time, but I really couldn't say—that's the whole point. This would merely be a calculated guess, and that's all, not knowing anything more than just seeing the wound itself.
Mr. Specter. But did you, in fact, see the wound prior to the time the incision was made?
Dr. McClelland. No.
Mr. Specter. So that any preliminary thought you had even, would be based upon what you had been told by Dr. Perry?