Coast to Coast AM with Art Bell - Janis Amatuzio - Death and the Hereafter
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Well, don't need much of an introduction from me, do you?
That did it quite well, numbers right up front, my goodness.
Actually, from the Southeast Asian capital city of the Philippines, Manila, I am Art Bell, and this is Coast to Coast AM, the weekend version, and I'm here to report to you tonight.
First of all, all of you who wrote to the newspaper, To try and correct that horrid little letter that's been circulating around the world.
I bet it's gone around the world a hundred times more in the time that it's been out.
Even more.
And then of course it was published by a newspaper here the other day in the Philippines.
And all of you wrote messages to them, and of course I did as well.
And they have published a retraction today, which I shall now read to you.
And you can see it on the website as well.
It says, email hoax at BC column.
The Chronicle was caught off guard last Wednesday when a columnist reprinted an email sent by a regular contributor of the Orbiter, a bi-weekly column of a lawyer.
He's a lawyer, Danilo Bentugin, who is also a city lawmaker.
The Chronicle is retracting the story published last Wednesday as it apologizes to radio commentator Art Bell who emailed Ben Tugend himself to complain that the email purportedly written by him was a hoax as he already denied several years ago.
Ben Tugend admits in his column this Sunday's issue that he received the forwarded email from Eddie Manigatay, a former mentor of Holy Name University here, who is now based in the United States.
See, it goes around the world.
Bantugan said that, I'm quoting here, I'm not just slaughtering the context, I'm quoting exactly.
Bantugan said that he, quote, He even don't know Art Bell, the alleged author of the literary piece entitled Hate Letter for Filipinos.
The Philippine Daily Inquirer, the country's leading newspaper, was also a victim of the same article sometime in 2001.
This was learned by the Chronicle only last Thursday after numerous reactions were received by Van Tugen and this paper's editorial office regarding the article.
They got thousands of emails, folks.
Going on, the Chronicle learned from David Moshe that Art Bell, radio commentator of the renowned radio program Coast to Coast AM, had recently married a Filipina and relocated to Manila as he continues to host the weekend edition of Coast to Coast.
It is a program which reportedly deals with UFOs, strange occurrences, life after death, and other explained phenomena, which is heard on 500 radio stations across the United States.
So, uh, there you have what they printed.
I particularly like the line where Bantugan said, quote, he even don't know Art Bell.
So there you have it.
They've printed the protraction, and you can see it for yourself on the website right now.
Along with, I might add, the webcam photograph, which was another photograph taken of Aaron in Hong Kong, which is where our child was conceived, by the way.
And looking carefully at that photograph, you can see why, actually, if you have an eye for that sort of thing.
Let's see, yesterday we were discussing invisibility, and I would like to extend an invitation to you all to continue, if you wish, mentioning, because I had to have had At least 300 fast blasts from people who wanted to comment about invisibility and couldn't get through what they would do.
Some of them were rather creative, involved our political leaders and that sort of thing.
So, if you want to continue to comment on that, we will do so.
Let's look quickly around the world.
Always a depressing endeavor.
Headline, diplomat cites U.S.
stupidity in Iraq.
Hmm.
A senior U.S.
diplomat said the United States had shown arrogance, that's in quotes, and also in quotes, stupidity.
I wonder how long he's going to be working for the U.S.
government in Iraq, but was now ready to talk with any group Except Al-Qaeda, in Iraq to facilitate national reconciliation.
In an interview with Al Jazeera Television, aired late Saturday, Alberto Fernandez, Director of the Public Diplomacy in the Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs at the State Department, offered an unusually candid assessment of America's war in Iraq.
Be watching for the possibility of a resignation at any time.
I added that.
Democrats hold solid leads.
Boy, this should be some interesting election.
It's not going well for the Republicans.
In four of the six Republican seats they need to capture the Senate, about 10 of 15 required to win the House, according to officials in both parties.
After two weeks of adverse publicity linked to the Mark Foley scandal, public and private polling suggested partial recovery for some endangered Republican incumbents and senior party officials made concerted efforts to project confidence.
Five bicycle bombs, bicycle bombs, and a hail of mortar shells ripped apart a market south of Baghdad Saturday.
That killed 18 people in yet another sign that Iraq's government and U.S.
forces were struggling to contain sectarian violence.
Personally, I think it has All that violence has something to do with our coming elections.
But that's just me.
The more violence, the more trouble, the more likely the Democrats are going to do well, don't you think?
This is certainly sad.
Thousands of people watched a pioneering parachutist jump to his death from a bridge during a festival Saturday when a chute opened too late.
I guess that means after he landed.
Lee Schubert, 66 years of age, died of injuries, suffered when he hit the water 876 feet below the New River Gorge Bridge during West Virginia's annual Bridge Day Festival.
Must have ruined that, according to Sheriff Bill Laird.
Mexican gangs, drug lords in Mexico now, are no longer simply content with killing their enemies.
What they're doing now Is severing the heads of those that have offended them in some manner, and then put the heads on sticks, right?
With little notes saying things like, see, hear, shut up, if you want to stay alive.
The message seems quite clear.
When we come back in a moment, we'll go to open lines.
So if you have something you want to comment on invisibility or anything else
Coming right up You know I have a story here about a Russian girl
named Natasha Who can see through things see through people?
I mean, they have proven it again and again and again.
I'll kind of hold the story for a little later or even tomorrow.
But, without question, there are certain people in the world who have abilities that the rest of us do not have.
Now, this is no joke.
She's proven it again, and again, and again, and again, under tight controls.
She can see people's internal organs.
She can see things that are wrong.
She can describe them.
She can draw them.
She can, oh for example, draw exactly where pieces of metal, fragments of metal have entered a person years ago, and then prove it all by x-ray.
So there are people who have these abilities.
I'll try and get to that tomorrow, but my point here is that if there are people who can do this, then there are people who can do other What the mainstream folks out there would consider to be superhuman things.
And I think that these people don't want to talk about it.
They don't want to advertise what they're able to do.
They just do it, for the most part, quietly.
Occasionally you get a story like this, but I think for the most part they do it quietly.
While we don't burn witches anymore, we sort of crucify them in other ways.
And so people who can do these kinds of things learn to keep them to themselves.
Anyway, for those who want proof, I will indeed read a portion of this to you tomorrow.
No, I'll read the entire thing to you tomorrow.
How about that?
On the international line from British Columbia, Canada, you're on the air.
Hello there.
Well, you're supposed to be on the air, but I hear you not.
There you are.
There you are.
Hi, Art.
Hello.
Is it me?
Yes.
Okay.
It's Nana.
How are you?
Well, hi there.
This is a young lady who came to visit us here in Manila.
Yeah.
How is Irene?
Um, she's fine.
A little morning sick, but otherwise fine.
Oh, that's... Oh, well, it's natural.
You know, actually, two Saturdays ago, we had a Thanksgiving party here in the house.
Canadian Thanksgiving party.
And Tom's sister Shirley and all his brothers were here.
And they're all great fans of you, so it was like we were expecting to hear from you that Saturday, but you had a guest, so it was like you could not take my call.
Hello?
Well, here you are now.
Yes, I am.
What is this?
I wonder if you can say hi to Shirley.
I know she has been a fan of yours.
Every 15 years he's been listening to you.
For 15 years?
Yeah.
Alright, hello Shirley.
We're not really supposed to do that, but since you brought it up.
I know.
So maybe I'll email Irene one of these days because, you know, congratulations for the baby.
Thank you.
Yes, by all means, email Irene.
Yeah, I'm very happy for you.
My God!
So the main squatters will have somebody they're leaving for.
That's it.
Yeah, that's nice.
So I hope you're fine.
I'm fine.
She's fine.
And thank you very, very, very much for the call.
That was indeed a young lady who visited us here in Manila about three or four weeks ago and is now back home in Canada.
And actually, that's the truth.
My wife's name is Irene.
Now, it's spelled A-I-R-Y-N.
I think I've explained this previously.
I refuse to say Irene.
I say Aaron.
I kind of like Aaron.
She kind of likes Aaron, as a matter of fact.
And even a lot of Filipinos who pronounce her name pronounce it as Aaron.
They've never seen that pronunciation before.
Actually, the way it occurred is, her mom wanted to name her Irene.
However, the priest who did the water dabbing and baptized her was German, and he wanted not the spelling that her mom wanted, but A-I-R-Y-N, as the Germans, I guess, would do it, and so that's how it ended up that way, but it eternally confuses people who are either Filipino or American.
Therefore, I call her Erin.
First time caller line, you're on the air.
Hi.
Hi.
Hello there.
Am I here?
Well, it sounds like you're there.
Yeah.
I didn't hear the name.
Something crackled and I got lost.
I was calling about invisibility.
Yes, sir.
And I noticed when I was in school that There was a particular mindset that I could put myself in and people who are actively looking for me could not find me even though I was right in front of them.
You know, I've heard this from a number of people.
Now it's not exactly, maybe it's not exactly optical invisibility.
It has been suggested that what you have in effect done is to sort of hypnotize the people that you don't want to see you.
Yeah, it's almost like the old shadow series.
You know, you can't see him because he doesn't want you to, you know?
That's right.
But I've had people like girlfriends who were actually looking for me, who I was within five or six feet of them, and they could not see me.
And I always thought that was very interesting that the human mind has so many abilities that we haven't even tapped.
Well, it does.
Now, sir, the question is, we're actually moving toward, conceptually, being invisible.
I mean, really invisible.
Yes, the mechanical way of being invisible.
That's right.
Bending light.
Bending light, yes.
And that works for machines, but I don't really think that human beings need machinery to become invisible.
I think we just need to learn how to use our Full faculties, and we can do pretty much anything we want to do with reality.
Well, you could test your theory.
In fact, I would love to see you test your theory in some serious endeavor.
Yes.
I've loved your show, sir.
You stretch the bounds of perception.
I stretch everything.
Yeah, well, good for you, man.
I've loved listening to you for about, I guess, 17 years now.
And you keep on stretching.
All right, buddy.
Thank you.
Thank you very much.
I wish people would stop doing that.
I don't wish to be called a legend in my own time, even though that alludes to the fact that I'm still here.
Nor an icon.
Nor do I enjoy hearing, I've been listening to you since I was a baby.
Or my children told me about you and now I'm retired and I'm, you know, listening, that kind of thing.
While I appreciate the fact that you listen, try and not put me in that category, if you can.
Let's go to a wild card line and say, hello there in Gainesville, Florida, you're on the air.
Good afternoon.
Good evening.
This is a miracle getting through to you.
I have about 19 miracles that I wanted to send you, e-mail or snail mail, but two in particular.
I was hit by a car when I was four years old.
Back in 1951, every car had these big kettle catcher bumper cars.
When I reached down for a ball, it hit me like between my shoulder and head.
And the car never hit its brakes until after I hit it.
I mean, it hit me and, like, I was dragged for 30, 35 feet.
I mean, the skid marks.
And I went out and came back, woke up on the curb.
And, I mean, that was a miracle in itself that I survived through that.
I would say.
It's been kind of pathetic.
You know, like, I have, like, I see things.
I have dreams that come true.
I know what things are going to happen to stuff like that.
And I don't know if you know of a man by the name of J.P.
Pickens.
He was a famous banjo picker in the 60s.
Man, no.
Well, anyway, I was living out in like a gazillion miles from everything, kind of like what you were liking from.
And like it was just a very small subdivision with only a handful of houses, you know, totally stone quiet.
And in the middle of the night, I heard I heard and felt him as There was a knock on the door and he jumped out a window
and I heard and felt him go out and it's like he came to me in the middle of the night.
And since then I've had even more powers.
All right, well we'll hold it at those two and email me the 17 others or for that matter
the total list of 19.
19 miracles is a lot.
I was not a bazillion miles from anywhere.
I was exactly 65 miles from Las Vegas which is definitely, definitely somewhere.
Going to wild card line 4 in Ann Arbor, Michigan, you're on the air.
Hi Art.
When I was younger I...
I would use the Cloak of Invisibility a few times, walking up on a group of people, and I would be there for several minutes, three to five minutes, and then I would make myself known, and they would say things like, where'd you come from?
Alright, Tim, stop now.
If you really can do that, like the last caller, or the previous caller, tell everybody.
How do you do it?
Well, I would just have a mindset that I wouldn't be able to be seen when I walk up on the group of people, and it just worked, I guess.
Well, I've heard this from people, and now I'm really curious.
Maybe we can get some people in the audience to try it.
So you're telling me you just sort of set up your own mindset, saying to yourself, look, these people are not going to be able to see me.
Correct.
And you concentrated as hard as you could on that, and sure enough, they didn't see you.
Correct.
Yeah, and it was rather interesting.
I've also had an experience where I was in a car, and I was driving a couple people in my car, and I had the mindset that these people won't be able to move.
And all of a sudden, the person next to me on the rider's side stiffened up and said, I can't move, I can't move.
You know, different things like that.
I mean, these things are possible, you know.
Maybe you're like this young lady in Russia.
It's actually a very interesting story, again, and I'll try and get to it tomorrow.
But there's no question about the fact, I mean, this is tested six ways from Sunday.
This young lady can see things inside of people.
She can see illness in various organs.
She can tell you and draw pictures of exactly where it is.
Metallic objects, for example, that have entered her A-body.
She is able to document where they are.
It's pretty wild stuff.
And maybe now people can make themselves invisible.
I'm Art Bell.
Scott suggests that perhaps these guys were so boring that the group simply didn't notice them.
Steve from Springfield, Missouri says invisibility can be achieved by consciously collapsing your aura.
Well, perhaps so, Steve.
I suggested to the caller a little while ago, and I will now further suggest, that the next time he passes a highway patrolman, do your little aura collapsing.
Concentrate as best you can.
As you're passing the highway patrolman, honk your horn a couple of times.
Flip him the bird.
Now, if you are really invisible, You'll be able to give me a quick call and say it worked, Art.
Or, conversely, if it didn't work, they will, I believe they must allow you one call.
Try and make it to coast to coast AM.
Alright, back to open lines and oh incidentally at the top of the hour we're going to be talking with Janice Amatuzio
who was trained at the University of Minnesota and is a county medical examiner in the
medical examiner's office in Minneapolis and she is an amazing woman.
I mean, this doctor is here to comment basically on life after death.
And we've had her on one time before.
You just don't get people like coroners, forensic types, doctors who believe in life after death.
You just don't get them.
But we've got one.
So we'll be talking to her shortly.
Let's go to Steve in California and say hello Steve.
Hello Art.
Howdy.
How are you doing?
Fine.
That's good to hear.
I have a couple of quick things on invisibility and then one very quick question if I may.
Fire away.
There's a movie called The Hollow Man featuring Kiefer Sutherland.
Have you seen that?
I have indeed.
Okay.
The other one is Mystery Men featuring the Invisible Boy.
The one I have not seen.
Oh, I highly recommend that.
Mystery Men?
The Invisible Boy is invisible, but the caveat is that he's only invisible when no one is looking at him.
It's a hilarious movie.
Well, there apparently is something to this, or there is about to be.
Now, this is not mind power doing this, sir.
This is real science.
I totally understand.
I've seen on television years ago where they had incredible camouflage that tended to make The individual blended into the background.
This does more than that.
It'll make you invisible.
If you were invisible, sir, what would you do?
I'd probably just stay home and behave myself.
But I want to ask you this one question, Hart.
You live in the Philippines now, and I know they have some huge honking mama spiders over there.
And I wonder if you could relate for me in the audience, what so far is the biggest and Most radical spider you've ever seen.
Boy, is this going to be disappointing.
I have not seen one spider since I've been here.
Not.
One.
Spider.
That's not saying that they don't have big honking spiders here, but I've not seen one, so sorry about that.
First time caller on the line, you're on the air.
Hello?
Yeah, you talking to Mike out of West Palm?
That would be you.
Okay, I was wild card, but uh, Actually, your last caller got it wrong.
It's not Keith or Southerland.
It's Kevin Bacon and Elizabeth Shue.
Okay.
But actually, that was kind of the movie I was going to reference to about invisibility is the potential for the great evil that would be occurred.
What do you think?
What kind of evil do you imagine?
Well, in referencing the movie, when I talk about what I was referring to, Kevin Bacon basically created the science to create invisibility.
And turn around, he went on a rampage of rape and murder.
That seems to be in the mind of many, sir.
Most of the responses yesterday included sexual matters and money.
Yeah, but my thing about that, that's the great responsibility that would be required of such a thing.
Because yesterday, one of the callers mentioned about, well, if we develop it, terrorists will develop it.
Actually, I'm the one who mentioned that.
But something I know from my experience with military hardware was in the 50s, the United States Navy developed a weapon system and decided there was no countermeasure, but in turn around, the Russians did develop it.
So, in a sense, we do need to develop the technology.
Oh, I agree.
Completely.
And it's a very good point.
If something conceivably, conceptually can be done, then you might as well go ahead and do it.
Because if you don't, clearly your enemies will.
And I really wonder, for mankind, how long that will be our mindset.
And I'm not saying that we don't get technical advances because of things that our military and our space program does, because of course we do.
But I really do wonder how long we will continue with the mindset, man will continue with the mindset, that we must develop this new terrible weapon or technology before the other guy does.
Probably forever.
I don't want to feel and get you all depressed about it, but I would think it probably will go on and on until this great light descends from the heavens and makes us all as one, hand-holding flowers in the air and all that.
East of the Rockies, you're on the air.
Hi Art, how are you?
Okay, sir.
Do you remember that old 50s movie called The Man with the X-Ray Eyes?
I'm sure you have.
Of course, yes.
And like, I forget how it ended, but I remember there was at one point he was charging people to do what that girl does over there, like he would look at her.
Well actually, she's doing that too.
She has begun, because the only way her family could afford to send her to the university was to charge, so it's 400 rubles for each consultation, but she can really do it.
That's just like the movie.
I love classic movies just like that, but I don't want invisibility.
Where's my Blade Runner car?
I want my flying car like in Blade Runner.
I do too, but I have this depressing feeling.
I expected much more progress from the Skycar by now.
Imagine the insurance on that.
Especially for teenagers.
Well, forget them.
Even me.
I'm 61.
If I had one of those, I'd rip the air up.
No question about it.
I'm gonna hang up but I want to tell you the real quick story about how I ran across your show.
It's really quick, okay?
Yes.
I was driving to work one day and it was raining really bad and there was a sign here in Houston on the freeways that bad weather turned on to blah blah AM radio and so I did because the weather was really bad and so I listened to it and cool and I went back to, you know, FM, which I hate saying that now.
Anyway, I went back to FM and then like a week later For some reason, I turned the car on, and for some reason it was back on AM, and I don't know how, and it was at that last station, and it was yours.
Well, we have that ability, sir.
I can tell.
We can control your radios.
And I can tell.
And it was on AM and the last station, which was yours, which I didn't know at the time, and you were on, which I didn't know it was you, but it was you.
And it was these cool subjects about, you know, All these cool things, you know, that you were talking about, which is all new to me.
I'd never heard of.
And that's how I got introduced to your show.
And what I'm getting at is... You know, Robert, we acquired that power some years ago.
Did you?
We're trying not to abuse it, but you know, of course, if we're going to control your radio and where the dial is, we're going to put you on our, you know, one of our affiliates.
And you sure did.
And what I'm getting at is, I said to myself when I was here and this gentleman was speaking about pyramids under the water and things like that, And what I'm getting at is, in the middle of the show, I was mesmerized.
And you know what I said to myself, right?
I said, wouldn't it be cool if they did this every night?
And that's a true story, sir.
And I tuned in the next night, and it was.
And I said, no way.
And that's going on, I think, five years now.
Well, try turning your radio to a different station, Robert.
We'll take care of it post-haste.
Oh, yes, we developed that technology years ago.
It's easy.
Got a little button here I can push, and we've actually now got it down to geographic capabilities.
In other words, we can take all the radios, for example, in the northwest part of the United States and cause them to tune to one of our affiliates while leaving people in the southwest still free to listen to whatever they want to listen to.
Bob in Nevada is on the air now on Coast to Coast AM.
Hello, Bob.
Hey Eric, this is Bob from Pahrump.
How you doing?
You're in Pahrump?
Yeah!
Now, it is imperative, Bob, that you tell us what station you're listening to.
Well, I am still got 840 on because I have not over to Hump yet.
As soon as I go over to Hump, I switch over to K995.
Well, then you're not in Pahrump.
You're in Las Vegas.
Well, I'm on my way to Pahrump.
I live in Pahrump.
I see.
All right.
Well, when you get to the top of the hill, it's 95.1.
Oh, yeah.
It's locked into my radio already.
Okay.
I just wanted to give you a real quick ghost story we had.
My wife and I are performers.
We used to work around the country a lot.
We spent a couple of summers up in St.
George, Utah, and we were in an apartment one summer, and we noticed things kept disappearing out of our apartment.
They disappear, and then like a week or two later, they would come back again.
One item in particular was an electronic organizer I had that disappeared.
We couldn't find it.
We came back late that evening, we found it right in the middle of a plate of food.
It had just come out of nowhere.
In the middle of a plate of food?
In the middle of a plate of food, stuck to the plate.
It had gotten there apparently while we were gone.
It doesn't stop there.
In the middle of the night, a couple of nights later, I can hear the carpet crunching underneath somebody's feet.
And I was laying on my side, I looked up, and there was a totally black figure walking towards me, slightly bent over.
And he was coming slowly towards me.
I was both wide awake.
I grabbed my cop's flashlight.
I was ready to whack the guy.
And suddenly his body just kind of broke into pieces.
The pieces floated apart and they got smaller and smaller until they were gone.
Well, I laid there and shook for about 20 minutes and finally woke my wife up and told her what happened.
One of the guys from the show with us just happened to be a shaman.
His father was a Navajo shaman.
He was a shaman.
We had him come into the house and talk to us and, you know, take a look at it.
And he spoke to the Spirit, and he told us after a while, he said, there's an old man.
He says, while he was hunched over, is this an old man?
He's right over here, and he hangs out by this doorway over here.
And that was exactly where he saw the guy before.
And he said, he's just worried that you're going to change things here.
And we said, we'll tell him we won't.
So we did.
And after that, we seemed to have no trouble at all for the next couple of months we were there.
Well, there you have it, my friend.
These kind of things really do occur, and there was a... was it a Twilight Zone, or what was it?
There was this place called the Land of the Lost.
And we've all lost things.
I have lost heaven knows how many pens, pencils, cigarette lighters, various objects, and somewhere, perhaps deep underground and guarded well, there is this giant pile of stuff.
That has been lost.
Stuff that has just simply disappeared.
Things that you know damn well you still have, but no, you don't.
They're gone.
You have searched everywhere, including the cracks in the couch, behind the couch, under the couch, under the bed, in the bed, and all around the house, and they simply are gone.
Well, these things have to go someplace, don't they?
Going now, actually, to the first time caller line, I believe.
Margie, South Coast of Oregon, you're on the air.
Hi Art.
What years did you live around the Monterey Peninsula?
Oh my God.
It would have been... Just give me a moment here.
Okay.
I think the late 70s comes to mind.
Uh-huh.
Mid to late 70s.
No, more than that.
Late 70s.
I'll settle on that.
Okay.
And I worked for KDON Radio in Salinas, for example.
And I also worked for a station in Monterey.
I did a talk show for a station in Monterey.
Well, I used to listen to you then.
I used to live there then.
But somewhere around, I think it was 1981, There was a sighting in Pacific Grove of a Bigfoot.
Did you ever hear about it?
I did not.
And it was a really strange thing because what happened in my experience, I never saw it, but it was dark and I had a housemate and my cat ran into my housemate's room because his window was open and Was just really upset about something outside and my roommate Tried to look couldn't see it, but said he heard monkey like sounds and so we thought that was really strange and then the next day a neighbor said that their dog had been inside and just went berserk started barking and wanted out and it was at the same time that
I had this experience with my cat.
Well, in the newspaper, it turned out that two teenage boys walking in Pacific Grove at night had seen a Bigfoot and went to the police department and they were really shaken up and reported it.
Okay, well there you have it.
I think that Bigfoot falls into the category, or at least I guess I've come to believe, that Bigfoot, for the most part, falls into the category of the paranormal.
These things are able to come and go, let's face it.
Other than somebody I once interviewed who claimed that he had shot and buried a couple of Bigfoot, that is the way you'd put it, right?
A couple of Bigfoot, not Bigfeet as in plural.
Other than that, these always disappear.
They come and go.
They really are part of the world of the paranormal.
I don't believe, I personally don't believe that Bigfoot is a real physical being because If that were the case, by this time we would have evidence.
And even going back to the show which I did with the fellow who claimed to have shot the Bigfoot, we never really got any hard evidence of it.
We almost did.
He almost was willing to go back to the site where he claimed he had buried them, but he freaked out.
For legal reasons, he was actually worried.
And actually, I understood why he freaked out and decided not to take us there.
He was right on the verge of doing it.
He thought he'd be charged with murder.
And the way things are today, why, one just never knows.
Let's go to the wildcard line in Connecticut.
Hello.
Hello.
Hi.
Hi, Art.
How are you?
Quite well, sir.
Congratulations on your pregnancy.
Well, you might want to rephrase that, but I guess it's... You know exactly what I mean.
I do.
I have two boys of my own, and I'm worried about their diet, actually.
I'm worried about GM foods.
I'm worried about viruses being sprayed on our meat.
What do you have to say about that?
Viruses being sprayed?
Who's spraying viruses on our meat?
Eating viruses that are being sprayed on our meat?
Well, I'm asking, maybe I shouldn't ask, but why, alright, let's try it from this point of view.
Why would somebody want to spray viruses on our meat?
Now that's a good question, but our lovely Congress, I mean our Food and Drug Administration has okayed it, that we can spray viruses on our meat to eat bacteria, Oh, I see.
You're saying it's something being done to ostensibly make it more healthy.
Perhaps give it longer shelf life or get rid of something.
Okay, well, maybe.
A lot of people absolutely hate anything that is Abinormal.
Anything that is not natural.
Anything that's done to preserve shelf life.
Any irradiation that's done to anything, they're scared to death of it.
I am not particularly one of those people, although I am alert to what could happen, I suppose.
East of the Rockies, you're on the air.
Good afternoon, Art.
Good afternoon.
I just wanted to say it was good to hear your voice again.
My late mother was a missionary and she helped start a lot of churches in the Philippines and really had a heart for that area, sir.
Art, I wanted to ask you about, say, circa 1962, around when you first started in the radio.
You worked at a gospel radio station, didn't you?
The first radio station I worked at was in Franklin, New Jersey, sir, and it was a religious radio station.
Yes, sir.
The fellow who owned it, as a matter of fact, hated people who got too close to the microphone, so he used to come in, in the middle of a newscast, that was as much as I got to do every hour, I got to read five minutes of news, and if he thought I was too close to the mic, he would yank the chair out from under me.
All this while we're on the air, so you would hear and you'd hear me scream and everybody knew I was too close to the mic.
Did it affect you any towards your face or anything like that being, I gotta say, hypocritically treated by somebody like that?
Did it bother you any?
No, I was so thankful for the opportunity to be on the air, sir, that I just dusted off my now sore butt, got back in the chair, backed away from the mic a little bit and kept on reading.
Lord bless you.
Bless you as well.
Thank you very much for the call, sir, and you have a good day.
When we come back, we're going to be talking to Dr. Janice Amatuzio, I believe it is.
We'll have her correct me.
Gee, we did a show before, I should know, shouldn't I?
I'm Art Bell.
Certainly is.
Good morning, good afternoon, good evening.
The adventure begins now.
Can you imagine a doctor here to talk about the afterlife?
Dr. Janice Amatuzio was trained at the University of Minnesota, the Hennepin County Medical Center, and the Medical Examiner's Office in Minneapolis, Minnesota before founding Midwest Forensic Pathology, PA board certified in anatomic forensic and clinical pathology.
She is a recognized authority in forensic medicine.
Has developed many courses in topics, well, for example, such as death investigation, forensic nursing, and forensic medicine in mortuary science.
Dr. Amatuzio serves as coroner and a regional resource for multiple counties in Minnesota and Wisconsin.
Dr. Amatuzio is often called the compassionate coroner.
He's an exemplar for the compassion practice of forensic medicine.
It's going to be indeed a very, very interesting interview, so Dr. Janice Amatuzio, coming
up in a moment.
Dr. Janice Amatuzio, welcome back to the program.
Thank you so much, Art.
It's so good to talk with you again.
Yeah, great to have you.
You know, it's so unusual to speak to somebody in your position who apparently believes what you believe, but let us begin with what you really are, what a forensic pathologist really is, what you really do.
Well, I'm a physician, an MD.
I specialize in pathology which is both the fields of anatomic and clinical pathology and that means basically the ability to diagnose disease both by looking at tissues whether it be a biopsy or by doing an autopsy and that's called anatomic pathology.
Let me stop you right there, Doctor, and ask you, just out of curiosity, you just said it yourself, you're a physician, right?
Yes.
So you could have made the choice to become a general practitioner, you could have made the choice to go on and become some other sort of specialist dealing with Live patients and but instead you work either with the deceased or you study tissue and I just wonder if you can explain what was in your mind when you made that choice?
Well you know it really started a long time ago.
My father who was an internist had really encouraged me to go into medicine And I decided, of course, as a little girl, I was going to be just like him, so I was going to be an internist, too.
But Dad also really loved the laboratory and pathology, and when I was in medical school, he insisted that I take a rotation in pathology.
It just so happened that this rotation at the Hennepin County Medical Center shared the morgue with the Hennepin County Medical Examiner's Office.
And I tell you, figuring out what really happened, figuring out the mystery, working with the law enforcement and using all those skills.
Well, I tell you, I think that specialty chose me.
I was absolutely smitten by it.
And this was in the late 70s.
You know, this was before we had All of the marvelous shows that we have now, like CSI and Crossing Jordan and Law & Order.
Actually, you mentioned CSI.
Let's start there, or at least let's spend a little time with CSI because I love the show.
But one of the things that I found out when Ramona died, my wife, was that a lot of what you see on CSI is total baloney.
And when I say that, I mean, for example, Time of death.
On CSI, my God, they kneel over a dead subject, and usually they come up with something like, well, she died between 920 and 935, or something like that.
That's just not reality, is it?
It's not at all.
You know, those shows are fascinating, and I know we're going to talk about what they mean, perhaps, to us today, but what they have done is they have raised Public awareness and public expectations.
Now, I think most people who watch them realize that most forensic pathologists aren't paid well enough to drive a Hummer, and that they usually do death investigation with the lights on, not with the lights off and a flashlight, and that you can't get DNA results back in, you know, an hour.
If people can see beyond that, and most people can, they can really see that these shows, I think, really reflect some of the ways that we are starting to grow and evolve.
Let me just go there right now.
As a forensic pathologist and as a death scene investigator, we speak for the dead.
We study that most mysterious thing, death, and we study life, because each death investigation is really a life investigation.
We get to look at how people have thought about things.
You know, everything we see is usually a decision at one point.
What clothes am I going to wear today?
What color underwear?
What car am I going to drive?
So we get to see how people have shaped their lives with their thoughts.
We can really get an insight if we just use observation instead of judgment.
And so, I think that this forensic fascination that we have is really a metaphor today for our changing awareness, our enlarging awareness.
Let's face it, when I'm at a death scene, I say, who are you and what happened?
I have a sense that what we are really doing now is we're starting to say, who are we and what happens?
And I think that's why I really cut the shows a lot of slack, because I think they are just really a metaphor for our change in consciousness right now.
That said, I did have a lady call a couple of years ago when we had an unidentified body in a county just to the north of here, and she said, You will be testing for squirrel DNA, won't you?
And I said to her, you have got to be kidding.
And she said, well, I saw it on CSI last night.
But you know, there are some things.
What it has done for me when I go to the county boards and ask for more money to do my job is that county commissioners now say, well, it does seem like that stuff is kind of important.
I think they're starting to get it, too, because the public's really starting to expect quality in forensic medicine, like they do in the intensive care units.
All right, well, just for the sake of the audience, and for the sake of my sake, too, I would like to know, of those things, those apparent miracles that we see on CSI, how many are based in reality, and how many are sort of myths that television has propagated for as many years as I've been watching it?
Well, what the pathologist does as a rule is pretty good, but I tell you, I watch that show at times, CSI, and I am stunned, and I've actually thought to myself, I hope that juries don't expect me to do what those people are doing.
So, I would say that it's probably 40% truth and 60% exaggeration.
60% exaggeration.
Okay.
I have heard.
What happens to me when I watch those shows is I get a real severe case of Morgue Envy.
And I really wish I had some of those tools and fancy machines that they have.
Morgue Envy?
Morgue Envy.
It gives me a lot of ideas.
Well, so then some of what you've seen has been actually helpful?
Yes, it has.
Some of the techniques for when they examine bones, some of the lights that they use to look for bruises on bodies, some of the techniques they use to collect, you know, hairs and trace evidence.
Some of those things are good.
The other things, it's a little way out there.
Well, I just wonder why television has not corrected some of the myths, or do you think they just feel obligated to show the science as more than it is just because, well, it's TV and they've got to be dramatic?
I think it's the latter.
I do know this, that most of the fancy new machinery, techniques, instrumentation they is actually things that real people have developed that most of us forensic pathologists and medical examiners do not have access to because of cost or it's just too darn new.
But, for example, I saw a wonderful type of device for examining bones there, something that dipped the body down into a warm water bath, if you will, and then You could just pull the body right up.
This is when you're trying to remove tissue from bone on a badly decomposed or skeletonized remains.
And I actually said to the forensic anthropologist I work with at Hamline University, I said, did you watch CSI last night?
She said, I did happen to catch it.
I said, what did you think of that device for cleaning bones?
She says, I want one.
That's remarkable.
Doctor, what can bones like that tell you?
They can just tell you so much.
They can tell you all sorts of things.
You can look at fractures.
They can give you height, weight, sex, sometimes race.
The types of bending and breaking of the bones can give you an idea.
Let's say we had bending of the ribs as to whether or not This person had been struck with some heavy blunt object like a wood splitting mall or perhaps the ribs are just bent enough so that it looks like somebody was kneeling on his chest when they were beating him up.
You can look at patterns of fractures on the skull and sometimes even see which blows occurred first because a new fracture won't, as a rule, cross an existing fracture line.
Sometimes we can see healed rib fractures, healed bone fractures.
We can see evidence of right-handedness and left-handedness if the person was doing a repetitive job, say a woodcutter or something.
We can see wear more on one shoulder than on the other.
So, there really is a whole world that opens up when you study a human's bones.
Is it possible to actually tell, for example, blows that were given after death versus those prior to death?
Yes, sometimes you can, absolutely.
Because, just think of the analogy of wood, like a fresh branch, when it is broken it will tend to bend first and then break.
Right, right.
And that will be just like fresh bone, which is Which is still wet and alive.
And the post-mortem fractures will tend to just crack like dry brittle wood.
So, there are many times, not always, but many times where we can differentiate pre-mortem and perimortem fractures.
And by perimortem, I mean just right before death or right after death from fractures that have occurred weeks, months, years after.
Sometimes we have skeletonized remains in the woods.
A hunter might discover them, might step on them, and there will be a break.
And sometimes we can see that.
And it really is different than the injuries that might have occurred in and around the time of death.
It is fascinating.
How many of the death investigations that you do, percentage-wise, are interesting?
As in, you're really trying to figure out something that's complicated.
In other words, it might be a murder, it might be a natural death, and it's on your head to figure out which.
It really sometimes depends on the, what can I say, the complexion, the makeup of the area, the population.
Where you serve as medical examiner of forensic pathology.
Where I am, I have a mix of urban and rural.
And I do not have as many of the, say, drug-related homicides as the medical examiners who work exclusively in big cities.
However, I get things like farming accidents, people caught in a corn dryer.
The exhumation of remains of somebody who's been dead for 40 years because families never had answers and needed to know.
So I would say that the real big, oh my God, what is this?
Who done it?
Serious cases are probably more like 10 to 15 percent of the time.
The rest, the 80 to 85 percent, really are a repetition of Natural disease and patterns of injury that are very familiar, whether they are pedestrians hit by a motor vehicle or people dying of heart disease because of their diets, etc., etc., or hereditary predisposition.
And I got to tell you, looking at heart disease and strokes, etc., it gets pretty repetitive.
It really makes you want to change something.
You mean like your diet?
Oh, yes!
Your diet, your exercise and no smoking.
Yes, I'm in the throes of actually very close to cold turkey right now.
So proud of you.
Good for you.
Be proud of me when I succeed for a period of time.
Many of us quitters quit and quit and quit and quit but they tell me finally one of them will take and I'm hoping it's this one.
I think it's time.
Well that's good because it really is a healthy thing to do.
And I suppose when you're opening up chest cavities and looking at lungs of smokers, it doesn't inspire you to go grab one?
Oh no, and you know when I'm lecturing to law enforcement or some of my civilian death investigators who are not medical personnel or medically trained, I'll say to them, now here's the heart and lungs.
Was this person a smoker or not?
And it's just so easy to spot because the lungs of smokers are so black and you see the blebs, the little emphysematous blebs
on the tops of the lungs.
It's just so clear.
And the other thing that people don't realize is that when they smoke, it actually accelerates
the hardening and plugging of the arteries as well.
All right, now, all that said, on the other side of things, I want to ask you a very serious question and I hope get a very serious answer.
Okay.
I've always had the feeling that we're, of course, very much an anti-smoking society now.
In fact, smokers are frequently herded into these awful little rooms at airports where Anyway, they're not thought of well and every year we get
statistics that say there were 295,000, I'll just pick that number out of the air, smoking
related deaths.
Now I'm not on the side of smokers here, but I've often wondered if the phrase smoking
related death is not applied to just about everybody who dies and was a smoker.
In other words, somewhat inflating the apparent danger of smoking.
And I'm not trying to say it's not dangerous, because we all know that it is.
But I'm just wondering if those numbers might be somewhat larger than they might otherwise be for political reasons.
I wish I knew the correct answer to that question.
I know that as a forensic pathologist and medical examiner, we have been urged by the health departments to be very accurate with our death certificates, and when we see changes in the lungs, whether emphysema, chronic obstructive lung disease, things that are cigarette-related, or the cigarette-related cancers, the ones that arise in the bronchi or breathing tubes, We are really strongly encouraged to list that on the death certificate.
What I just can't and don't, as a rule, list is when I've got severe hardening and plugging and calcifications of the blood vessels, the coronary arteries, and that person is a smoker.
I usually don't list that, cigarette smoking, as an associated significant condition.
In other words, you look for the actual specific cause of death.
Yes, I do.
Do you tend to think that those numbers might be, again an honest answer, might be somewhat inflated?
I think they might be low.
You think they might be low?
I think they might be low.
In other words, more people than... Wow!
I just say that because I just see so much Got it.
No, listen.
I just wanted the answer.
Dr. Hold tight.
We're at the bottom of the hour.
We'll be right back.
I'm Art Bell.
Here I am.
Dr. Janice Amatuzio is my guest and she's really quite something.
She is indeed a doctor trained at the University of Minnesota.
And she is a board certified doctor in anatomic forensic and clinical pathology.
She's a recognized authority in forensic medicine and has developed many courses in topics such as death investigation.
And we're going to talk sort of about the other side of death as the interview progresses.
that coming up actually in a moment.
I think it's fair to say death is our greatest fear And death also is one of our greatest fascinations.
And Doctor, I wonder, why do you think we're so fascinated with death?
Well, I think it goes right back to Albert Einstein, who says the most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious.
And death is a great mystery.
And I think part of the reason that we have so much fascination right now with forensics is because we, as a society, are starting to question and look.
You know, it was, I think, a man named Kirk Schneider who wrote, The Starting Point of Consciousness is Awe.
He wrote something called Awe-Based Learning.
And I think that all of these shows that we were just talking about, you know, the forensic shows, I actually wonder if these don't signify an important milestone in our growth, in our level of awareness.
I wonder if the fascination might be a metaphor for a shift that's coming on, a shift in our level.
Part of the reason I think forensic is such a good way to look at death is that we're really taught to use our training, our education.
Everything we know, and then we've got to trust our instincts.
You know, one of my very good teachers, Dr. Cal Bant, used to say to me when I would despair, will I ever get this case figured out?
He said, oh Janice, he said, look, it's about 50% what you know and 50% what you feel.
And I think some of the best death investigators are able to make those intuitive leaps.
But I also think, to get to your question, Art, I think that most sentient conscious beings, human beings, when they reach midlife, turn their attention to, you know, the next phase.
And of course, what looms out there, but no death.
And I think that we all begin to look, and I think we begin to say, is this all there is?
What does it all mean?
How am I spending the moments of my life?
And so, it may also be just the disasters and tragedies we've had more recently, but perhaps every generation has some of those.
But we look to say, hmm, how can I make meaning out of this?
And I think the reason that we attempt to make meaning is because we realize that we We can choose to grow, as Rachel Naomi Remen says, bitter or better.
And most beings, human beings, choose to try to find a fuller, more meaningful experience of this thing we call life.
So, looking at death, I have a sense that that is what adds the urgency, the immediacy, the tension to our lives.
Okay, you said experience the mysterious.
Now, when it comes to death, this is a key question, I guess.
Do you think people are experiencing something or do you think that it's just, you know, the long, what's the right word?
Sleep?
The long sleep.
In other words, nothingness.
I can tell you, after listening to families for as many years as I have, I have really begun to wonder if there isn't something else out there that is stunning.
I've got to tell you, three weeks ago, I was lecturing on this subject to a group of cardiac arrest survivors.
Now, let me tell you, what a scary audience, because these are the real deal.
I mean, they came with their The paramedics who had resuscitated them, the cardiologists that had helped run the medical part of this, and I presented some of the stories and experiences that families have told me about, and a man came up to me.
He must have been in his late 60s, early 70s.
He had a name tag on that said, Pat-Survivor, and with tears in his eyes, he said, How did you know?
And I looked at him, and he said, You know, you got it right.
And I said to him, Tell me, how do you know?
And he said, Doctor, I had a cardiac arrest on an airplane.
I was gone eight and a half minutes before this.
And he pointed to this big burly man next to him.
This paramedic shocked me.
And the tears just streamed down his face.
He was so emotional.
He recomposed himself and he said, May I tell you what it was like?
I said, Oh, please do.
He said, Doc, you drop all religion like shedding your clothes.
He said, God isn't a man or a woman.
God is bigger than that.
And then he said, I still resent coming back.
It's so nice there.
And he said, You know, I saw my life.
And I realized I have a mission, and that's why I'm back here.
And I said, what is it?
And he said, I don't remember, but you know, it's supposed to be that way.
He said, you know, when you go there, you leave all man-made stuff behind.
Oh, I can buy into that.
But let me stop you and ask you, was this eight and one half minutes of clinical death I believe this was eight and one-half minutes of an abnormal cardiac rhythm like ventricular fibrillation and asystole.
So apparently this man just suddenly collapsed in his seat, stopped breathing, had no palpable pulse, and this paramedic who filled in some of the blanks said, the stewardess wasn't quite sure what to do.
He grabbed the defibrillator and went to work.
He said, this is what I do.
And so, that's what happened.
How long, normally, in a situation where a person's heartbeat is not to be detected and they're not breathing, how long can a person who is not in cold water, for example, I know that's an exception, be expected to come back given the paddles and the voltage and whatever can be done to bring that person back?
Well, without any significant brain damage, I'm sure is the question.
Usually three to five minutes, and five is way out there.
Three minutes, three and a half minutes, four minutes.
But what you've got to realize is that sometimes during a cardiac arrest, there is some perfusion of the brain.
It may not be perfect, but there's some blood perfusion, so there's some oxygen reaching it.
All right.
You were on my program, what was it?
I won a stage four years ago.
Four years?
Was it that long ago?
I think it was three.
November 30th, 2004.
You were on with George Norrie at that point.
Yeah.
And I think previously with me.
It was a long time ago.
Anyway, I'm quite curious.
After these appearances, I mean this is very public stuff, and you're saying things that frankly most physicians certainly would not say.
And so I'm curious, what kind of reaction you get from your colleagues?
Listen, let me tell you.
The most interesting reaction was from some law enforcement, some deputy sheriffs.
I was in Wisconsin doing some training and I'd finished three or four weeks of training and one of the sergeants And the Chief Deputy were helping me carry all of my gear back to my vehicle.
And just as I turned to shake hands, he said to me, you know, Doc, he said, I got to tell you something.
I heard you on Art Bell, you know, a couple of years ago.
And I was I was a little worried that you were way out there.
But you know, Doc, you're OK.
I said, well, thank you.
He said, you know, not not many people can can You know, do the work and cross the line just a little.
Well, yeah, it's not a line you can cross just a little.
That's right.
Now, let's see how far across the line you really do go.
Have you come to believe, Doctor, that there is a conscious existence after death?
That is true for me.
And I'm picking my words very carefully.
That is true for me.
That's a yes.
One of the most important things I say to my audiences, to the people I speak to, is, you know, the most important thing is to come to your own truth about this.
Come to your own belief.
It is more important to me that people learn to trust themselves, to listen to their own I don't care whether they agree with me or not.
And I'm really careful because I know as an MD, as a forensic pathologist, what I say is listened to.
But I think it's really important that you and our listeners realize that it doesn't matter what I say.
Everybody has to arrive at their own truth about this because dying is a journey we take alone.
And I have the strong sense that our beliefs, our hopes, beliefs, our knowing, do shape our experience after death, much like our thoughts and beliefs and knowings shape our lives before death.
My absolute feeling is that life goes on.
I am not arrogant enough to say I know exactly how it goes on.
I do have the sense that we, as whatever part of human beings we are, our spirits, our minds, something goes on.
Alright, you've come to this opinion, obviously, from listening to the stories of families.
In other words, you've had no personal experience of clinical death and coming back, and so you can't tell me your own story.
So, quite obviously, you've come to this view as a result of family members talking to you about things that have happened, that sort of thing, right?
Yes, that's correct.
I've actually talked to other physicians who have the same belief you do and have come to the conclusion by being at bedside when these things occurred.
So you're not alone by any means.
But it's unusual to find a physician who will actually come out publicly and say this sort of thing.
Since you're basing your opinion on anecdotal evidence from family members, do others say, look, that's exactly what it is, and so you're a woman of science, you ought not be saying this publicly.
I have had some people, some physicians, say to me, you know, Doc, you're getting a little far out there.
But others, when I walk through the hospital to the lounge, get a cup of coffee, sit and have lunch with these docs, what I find really helps is a healthy sense of humor.
You know, I do realize that when I testify in court, I take an oath to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth.
So help me God, I swear in front of the judge and the court.
And the attorneys say to me, can you tell doctor to a reasonable degree of medical certainty, you know, the cause and manner of death?
Yes or no?
And I have to laugh, because here in these two books I've written, in my conversations, in the lectures I give, which are much more widely attended than the forensic lectures, I can't prove a darn thing.
I really think it's kind of humorous.
to juxtapose forensic medicine with the after-death dreams and visions and synchronicities.
Although, I do see that the thing that links all of this is the great mystery.
You know, what happens next?
In forensic, I teach the importance of making an observation and not a judgment.
Leave you with an open mind and can take you a little further on the path.
Like I'll say to my investigators, if you're on your way to investigate a death that includes a gunshot wound, just call it a gunshot wound.
Don't say we've got a suicide or an accident or a homicide, because that's a judgment.
That's something you should arrive at only when you've gathered all the facts.
So I think what is happening And what has happened for me is that when I take the
forensic training, which says, keep an open mind, gather the facts, reserve judgment,
because you never know what you're going to find.
Things aren't always as they seem.
When you combine that perspective with some of these stories you hear, it sometimes does
take you to quite a place.
The place is, what if they're true?
Okay, well, you know, perhaps you can do for us what has been done for you.
You have heard stories that we have not heard.
Give me an example of the stories you've heard that have convinced you.
Well, listen, now, I have one story that is superb, but it's going to take me about ten minutes to tell it, so I don't want to break in the middle.
Let me just start with a nice, short story that said to me that I think, in some ways, these stories are so familiar to all of us, because that's one of the common threads I've seen, is that they're real familiar.
A young woman, a beautiful young woman, came up to me at a wedding two summers ago, and my husband is a police officer.
He happened to be the best man.
This was a young man that he had been training who asked my husband to be the best man.
And, of course, you know what first weddings are like.
You know, they do everything.
And it was fun, and we had a good time.
But I have to tell you, when I got to the party afterwards, I realized I was closer to the age of most of the parents than I was to the participants.
And I'm thinking, oh, I think I'm just going to sneak over in the corner and sit in one of those dark booths.
It was a hot summer day.
Well, I was walking over and a beautiful young woman comes up to me.
She tells me she's a friend of the groom.
She's maybe 20.
And I said, and what is it you do, Susan?
She said, well, I'm a jailer.
And I said, a jailer?
She said, yes, the men's jail.
And I thought, oh, those poor men.
And then I thought, oh, this poor woman.
What a hard job.
And she said, yes, it has been hard.
And she says, but I read your book, which was my first one, Forever Hours, and I have to talk with you.
And I said, fair enough.
So we talked, and she said, you know how hard it is to be in law enforcement the first year?
She says, they can fire you any time for no reason.
So I've really worked hard, and I've just been keeping my, you know, nose to the grindstone.
She said, I don't have any of my, either of my grandpas left.
I adopted my best girlfriend's grandpa, and his name is DeWette.
So she said, I hadn't visited him at all since I started this job.
It's my first year.
And he kept calling and saying, Oh, please, Susan, won't you come visit me?
I've just moved to a new place.
There's a fountain and a pond.
Come.
Well, she said, I made no time.
She says, I read your book, all these stories, and I was really I'm excited about it.
I fell asleep that night, and lo and behold, I had the most amazing thing happen.
She said, Grandpa DeWette appeared at my bedside.
He took me by the hand, and together we went hand-in-hand to his nursing home.
We sat down by the pond at the fountain, and I said, Well, what did you do?
She said, We talked about life.
And I said, Well, tell me, what did he say?
Well, she said, I can't remember now.
But he did say not to worry, that everything was just fine.
He said, when I woke up the next morning, I was so excited and so happy, I just could hardly wait to give him a call.
And so, I got up, I reached for the phone, and it rang.
You know what?
Most people know.
I wouldn't even have to finish the story, because most people know.
She said it was my girlfriend telling me that Grandpa DeWitt had been found dead in bed that morning at the nursing home.
And with that, of course, this young woman, you know, got up and left.
By the time I saw her again, it was clear to me that she had had four or five or six of those beers that I had.
I've had millions of stories like that.
Doctor, we're at the top of the hour.
Take a rest.
We'll be right back.
Dr. Janice Amatuzio is my guest.
I'm Art Bell.
Dr. Janice Amatuzio.
She's a coroner, really, a medical examiner.
She's a coroner and she has a personal belief in life after death.
And I was considering the word mystery during the break.
It is a great mystery, isn't it?
What do you suppose the world would be like if it wasn't a great mystery?
What do you suppose the world would be like if we all knew that death meant the end of everything, the great blackness, the great nothing?
Which, frankly, wouldn't be all that bad.
If you've ever had a really good dreamless night of sleep, I guess it would be like that, right?
But then there's another possibility.
Suppose the great mystery turned out to be, well, that there is some kind of extension of consciousness following death.
Either way, either way, if we knew for sure, how do you think that would change the world?
That might be a good question for the doctor in a moment.
So how about that, doctor?
Suppose the great mystery were not a mystery.
Consider it either way.
That it was, that we would all know there's nothing after death, it's just the great blackness, the end of all.
Or, that there is a consciousness that extends after death.
If it were proven either way, how do you suppose that would change society?
I think that's not an easy answer, but I would say That either way, I think that we would learn to treasure life more.
You see, I think that when I look at people who have had these experiences, that know without any doubt in their minds that they'll see their loved ones again, that life goes on, I really observe that they live differently than before.
Well, an inner knowing, a peacefulness that really creates such beauty in their lives.
It seems to be not what they're doing, it seems to be who they're being, and I frequently will say to people, and that's been the subject of, can I mention my second book, Beyond Knowing?
Of course.
That has been what I wrote about this time, because I'll say, Tell me, how has this changed your life?
And their answers are just amazing.
They say, oh, trust yourself.
Trust your feelings.
Life is perfectly safe.
It always goes on.
They say, all is well.
Live each life to the fullest.
Life's a phenomenal gift.
There's nothing to fear.
One man even said, you know, Doc, we're more than we know.
He said that makes me take a whole lot better care of myself.
Live each life to the fullest would suggest to me the possibility of reincarnation.
Yes, or live each day to the fullest.
Tell you, I had an interesting experience, just to go on the reincarnation thing, with a woman who came to me after a lecture and said, Doc, I committed suicide.
She didn't say I attempted, she said I committed it.
And my question, my first question as a forensic pathologist, well, how did you do that?
Well, she said, I was in a terrible marriage with an alcoholic husband and I threw myself out of a car at 60 miles an hour.
She said it was a stupid thing to do.
It hurt so bad.
She said, I lost consciousness because I hit my head.
I woke up in the emergency room floating up near the lights like so many people are familiar with.
She says, I look up, I see my mother and my father.
Just surrounded, I'm surrounded by such love.
I look down, and there is this body that's all broken up, and I really don't even recognize at that moment that it's mine.
And then I see this being of, you know, luminous light, and I see my life just kind of unfold in front of my eyes.
And she described it like a spool of ribbon that just unwound.
And she said, I saw All of the experiences of my life, and she says, it was amazing, she said, I saw that I had been so good to everybody in my life, except me.
And she said, she pointed her finger at me, she said, I was given the extraordinary opportunity to come back.
So remember this, Doctor, a lifetime is a phenomenal gift.
Use it well.
And those words caught me, because she didn't say a life.
No, a lifetime.
A lifetime.
Okay, we have ten clear minutes, unless that was the story you were talking about.
No, no, let me tell you this story.
You know, in every book there is a story.
This story knocked my socks off.
I was introduced to a woman named Patty Harvey.
By Brad Walton, a talk show host here on WCCO in the Twin Cities, and he said you need to talk with her.
And here's what she told me.
She told me about a couple named Kim and Mike, a couple that lived in Salt Lake City.
They were awaiting a kidney and pancreas transplant because Mike had insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus.
He was 32 years old.
He'd taken very good care of himself.
They got a call from the Latter Day Saints Hospital in the spring of 1994 and they said, we've got a match, come to the hospital.
So, Mike was brought in, he was put under anesthesia, the surgery took about 7 or 8 hours because he had a kidney and a pancreas and when his wife, Kim, went in to see him in the post-anesthetic recovery room, He, he barely opened his eyes.
He held her hand and he did not say, I love you, honey.
He said, Kim, my donor's name is Danny.
Oh my God.
And she, Kim was puzzled.
I mean, she was stunned.
She thought, what an anesthetic reaction we have here.
And she sat down and she held his hand a little longer, but he was just so in and out of anesthesia.
That she shortly left, she went back and sat in the waiting room and she told her sister.
Her sister says to her, oh my gosh, Kim, a man with that name died last night.
His name was Danny, Danny Lynch.
His name was on the board in the surgical waiting room.
They erased it after midnight.
Now, understand, this was before HIPAA, which is the Health Information Patient Privacy Act.
And now, I know that you know and our listeners know that You know, this sort of information, names of people in the hospital, diagnoses, simply cannot be discussed anymore.
Right.
But, this was 1994.
Now, what had happened 36 hours later was this.
A woman named Patty Harvey, who lives up here in the Twin Cities, had gotten a phone call at about 3.30 in the morning, and she said, the moment it rang, she knew something was wrong.
When she answered it, a person on the other end said, is this Danny Lynch's mother?
This is Latter Day Saints Emergency Physician, Dr. So-and-so.
Your son was severely injured in a motor vehicle crash tonight.
He was ejected.
He has serious blunt force head injuries.
Mrs. Harvey said, will he make it?
The doctor said, I don't think so.
And she said to the doc, I'm coming and no matter what happens, I want you to know this.
My son is a donor.
He was 27 years old.
He had moved from the Twin Cities down to Salt Lake City about eight months earlier because he had a new job.
He had new love in his life.
He was driving in the wintertime on an icy bridge over the Jordan River, lost control, was ejected, wasn't wearing his seatbelt, and this is what happened.
His parents jumped on the airplane here, got down there.
Okay, now, our listeners know that in order to get an organ like a heart, a lung, a kidney, a pancreas, not so much a kidney, but a pancreas, a small bowel, you need to have somebody whose heart is still beating.
And this was the case with Danny.
Now, Mike recovered.
A couple of days later, his wife, Kim, said to him, Mike, you said something to me right after surgery.
Do you remember?
And he apparently said, oh, honey, how could I forget?
I said, my donor's name is Danny.
And she said, well, could you tell me about that?
And he said, I saw him.
And it was the most amazing thing that has ever happened to me.
He said, something happened to me during surgery.
He said, at some point, I shifted and I could hear all of the conversations in the operating room.
I could see what was happening.
I was up above and I had absolutely no pain.
And I was just watching and he said, then I saw a man come in dressed in blue, surgical scrubs.
He was carrying a blue container and packed in ice were my organs.
And he said, when I saw that, I felt such an extraordinary wave of gratitude and love He said it was so intimate and so profound.
I was so grateful to the person who had donated those organs, who was giving me the gift of life, that I said to myself, I want to see my donor.
And he said, just like that, he said, I passed through a wall and I saw him.
He said he was laying there.
He was long, not tall, long.
He was thin.
And he had long, sandy-colored hair, and very good-looking man.
And he said, the next thing that happened, well, he said, it is really hard to describe.
He said, I felt like I was just, like, sucked up into this light, this extraordinary light.
He said, I was lifted up by this incredible force, and I heard the words, Danny has died, and you're going to live.
And he said, I saw three luminous beings.
He said one was somebody I knew.
It was my aunt.
He said the only way I recognized her was that she was wearing a scarf that I had given her.
Otherwise, I didn't recognize her because she looked so young.
And then I saw Danny, and then I saw this familiar being.
He said, I couldn't place who it was, but it was, this being was so familiar.
But he said that, and he said, I was filled with such indescribable joy.
And he said, I'm different now.
He said, I know who I am.
I'll never... I will know forever that I was in a sacred place.
I'll never fear anything.
He said, life and love is all there is.
My God, that's some story.
That really is a convincing story.
Isn't that something?
There's no way he could have known that name, right?
None.
And then his wife proceeds to go back through the obituaries, through a series of coincidences, got in touch with With Patty Harvey.
And Patty actually went to Salt Lake City and met Mike.
And she took a number of photographs of different people along.
She showed them to Mike and he went, that's him.
Boy, I've got to admit, that's one that nails it down alright.
Doesn't it though?
Wow!
I know!
Yeah, it really does.
I can imagine if you heard many of... and I've heard stories like that, in fact...
60 Minutes did a story.
I'm sure you've probably heard about it.
The lady who received both the heart and lungs of a young man.
Yeah.
She then proceeded to not only know the name of her donor, but began to acquire a taste for foods that she had never had before, which he had.
So, this suggests the possibility of tissue memory and, of course, your story much more, but at the very least, tissue memory.
Would you like to comment on that?
Well, I don't know too much about that, but what I will say is that I have been looking at this over and over again.
In addition to practicing medicine and forensic medicine, I've read a fascinating book by Bruce Lipton.
I like the tea.
It's called The Biology of Belief, and he talks about some extraordinary things.
He talks about how there are actually protein receptors on our cell membranes that actually can perceive energy.
And he talked about the fact that since atoms are composed of whirling bits of energy and Molecules are composed of atoms, and organisms composed of molecules.
He said, you know, perhaps we are just beginning to remember our ancient ability to perceive energy.
Now, I've had some people say, oh, you should never say that, because it demystifies everything, takes all the sacred out of it.
But I have a sense that we continue to learn so much from Those in quantum physics and cell biologists and as Walsh would say, there's something we don't know, the knowing of which would change everything.
Oh yes.
Alright, here's another one for you.
You remember the old movie Flatliners?
Yes.
I've asked others their opinion on this and I would like to ask you, if you were to intentionally stop the heart, not that you could ever do that legally of course, but if you were to intentionally stop the heart of an otherwise healthy and young person, and wait let's say two minutes, and then restart their heart again, What would you consider to be the odds of successfully restarting that heart, Doctor?
A healthy young person?
Yes.
I would say, now understand, I am just a pathologist, so I don't do this, but I would say, if I did know, that the odds would be quite good if it was under the right circumstance.
I mean, physicians do that all the time when they put someone on cardiopulmonary bypass.
They shock the heart, stop it, do their surgery and then go, you know, start it again.
And they do very well at that.
And many, many times that's not a young and healthy person.
Correct.
Correct.
So I would say they do pretty well at that.
And of course the healthier the person, the better it gets.
Do you have any idea by percentage how many people undergo that kind of procedure or actually
are clinically dead for any given period of time who come back with a story versus those
who do not?
I don't know.
In other words, how rare is this?
You know, I have a sense that it's not that rare.
And I can tell you when I lecture to people, I'll tell you what I do know and then I'll What I do know is this, when I lecture on this subject to groups of, you know, everyday people, even medical people, when I say to people, one of the patterns here is that you already know all of this.
And I said, and virtually everybody has heard of a story or has a story.
And I'll say this, anybody here, have they ever experienced this?
I would say 85 to 90% of the hands go up.
And they all smile and they nod, and I say, and do you talk about them?
Oh, absolutely not!
We think people think we're crazy!
Ah, so you don't think I'm crazy!
No, we're here listening to you talk about this!
But in terms of those who are actually cardiac arrest survivors, I can tell you this.
When I have spoken to groups of cardiologists, I have begun to get phone calls to my office from all sorts of their patients.
And they'll say, we'd like to make an appointment to see Dr. Amatrizio.
And my poor secretary will say, people don't make appointments to see her.
They just get to see her when they need to see her.
And they say, no, no, no.
We've had an experience.
So maybe 20%, maybe 30%.
I would think a cardiologist might be able to give you a little better idea.
So many people have these experiences, and it's not just now.
I mean, it's happened for thousands of years.
I have a sense there's something to it.
That's why I decided to pursue how we can live more meaningfully with these experiences, because I have a sense that just our awareness of them can help.
All right, well here's another question for you.
There is a traditional belief, certainly in the religious community, which is a big one around the world, that not only do people go to the light and to what we traditionally think of, Doctor, as heaven, But some who have led not such exemplary lives go to hell.
And so I wonder if you have any stories that include experiences that were not light, love, and you know, everything coming up roses.
In other words, any bad experiences.
Now I'll tell you, hold your answer to that and think it over because we're at the bottom of the hour.
Dr. Janice Amatuzio is my guest.
She speaks for the dead.
That's what people like the doctor do.
They examine the dead and they are the voice for the dead.
In her case, she finds more than the usual, or maybe I should say she tells us more than the usual.
I'm Art Bell.
It is.
This is the Highwaymen, the name of the group that does this song and it's all about reincarnation.
One of the subjects we've touched on with Dr. Janice Amatuzio, she speaks for the dead.
That's one way to put it, I think.
I think a very elegant way to put it, actually.
Can you imagine?
The stories you've heard, the things that are not possible, the person who knew the name of the donor that gave life, how impossible is that?
Where does that information come from?
Anyway, we'll return to Dr. Amatuzio and more stories like that in a moment.
In considering the great mystery, part of that consideration has got to be the religious
In other words, heaven.
And then, of course, hell as well.
So, one would imagine, if people really did get sort of a glimpse of the other side, that occasionally that glimpse would be of something not necessarily to their liking.
Doctor?
Well, you know, Art, I go back to the conversation you had with Daniel Brinkley.
I also go back to a man that I spoke with who had a tumor, something called a malignant melanoma, a pigmented, highly aggressive tumor of the skin.
At the time that he was diagnosed, he had not only a large lump on his upper arm, but it had spread to his lungs.
Because the tumor on his arm was causing all sorts of problems His doctor decided to remove that even though he couldn't be cured.
And this man was a farmer.
His farm, I was told, was an absolute mess.
His wife was unhappy.
His children had moved away.
There was just lots of disrepair there.
Apparently something happened during that surgery when this Man had that eruptive tumor on his arm removed.
He told his physician that he had an opportunity to review his life, and he saw the consequences of his actions, and how he had caused distress or pain to his wife, his family, even some of his animals, I guess.
After the surgery, I guess he changed.
And that change was evident in two ways.
First of all, people noticed that his farm looked different.
And his wife was happier.
And his children moved home.
But the physician who told me this story said that the biggest change was, he said, I had him in my office.
Three months later, I took a chest x-ray.
And you know what I'm going to tell you.
All of the tumors in his lungs were gone.
Oh my God.
I did not know you were going to tell me that.
Some people might think that, but have I ever heard a bad story?
I can tell you I've never heard a story that had the very classic fire and brimstone and things like that.
I've heard stories where people have told me, I've seen what I've done in my life, and I decided to change it, and I was so happy to have the opportunity to come back and do that, and it really does make me think, hmm, you know, the example of our life lived is really, I guess we're really the architects of all of that, and it has made me wonder about how to create a life that has more beauty than
The sadness in it and how important that is.
Usually if you have malignant melanoma in your lungs, well that's it.
You're gone.
How frequently, I mean how frequent is a spontaneous remission of that kind?
It just doesn't happen.
I mean this fell into the category in my mind of, you know, unexplainable.
What somebody might call a miracle.
And I think the important thing here is to realize, and we could talk about all sorts of things like that, but it seems that people who have these extraordinary out-of-body experiences do come back different, do come back changed.
And the only thing I can say, and I've really thought about that story, I've never written about it, not in my first book or my second one.
But Albert Einstein said that thoughts influence the body.
And I'm not saying that we cause our own malignancies or our own disease, you know, exclusively.
Well, if you had said that, I might buy into it.
Well, you know, I don't know that we always do it consciously.
Maybe on some unconscious level, that might be our soul's agenda.
But boy, I'm getting so far out on the limb here.
I'm not real comfortable with that, but I do know that, I'll tell you this, I did a post-mortem examination on a woman two years ago, lovely lady who was in her 40s, late 40s, horribly thin, and she was a smoker, and when I did her post-mortem examination, I found that she had a big bleeding ulcer in her stomach, and this ulcer must have been so painful, and it had bled, and it filled her Gastrointestinal system with blood.
And some of the ulcers that we see, we know are caused by stress.
And I said to her husband, when I called him and talked to him after the autopsy, I said, here's what I found.
I said, by any chance was your wife stressed or was there something bothering her?
And he said, oh, yes.
He said, our only child, our son, is in Iraq and she's just, quote, worried sick.
About his safety.
And I just was like, ooh!
You really can see sometimes the results of our thoughts in our bodies.
Well, that brings up another topic.
You began at some point calling the families of those you have autopsied.
Why?
What started you doing that?
You know, I started off in internal medicine before I went into pathology.
And during that internship, as well as in my rotations in medical school, I saw that after surgery, the surgeons would come out and talk to the family and let them know what they'd found, and then would go in and sometimes, if the patient was wide awake enough, would greet the patient.
Now, obviously, a pathologist can't talk to a patient, they're deceased, but on the non-criminal cases, Not the ones where it's a whodunit, because I will never do anything knowingly to interfere with a law enforcement investigation.
Sure.
But, you know, on the natural death, the car accidents where there's no criminal charges on the suicides, I began calling the families just to let them know what I'd found, to tell them if I had any tests that were still pending, because I thought, that's the decent thing to do.
And that was the one thing that I did differently, that really opened the door for me.
And I do have to tell you, you know, when I started, I almost quit.
It was so hard to do.
I just wasn't prepared for all that grief.
But that's where the stories came from, though.
Yes, that's right.
That's right.
I think when you go into something that's a little uncomfortable, and you get outside your comfort zone every now and then, you get a terrific little gift.
That's what these stories have done.
Actually, the stories have comforted me because I really was searching for a way to continue doing forensic pathology and not grow just so discouraged that I would quit.
Alright, well here's something I'd like you to tackle, because I think there's something to it, Doctor.
The dead frequently seem to try to get messages to the living, to the relatives, right?
Or to the loved ones.
And there seems to be...
A kind of a window of opportunity, a rather short window of opportunity.
Sometimes days, perhaps a couple of weeks at the most.
Not very long.
This little window of opportunity where the dead do seem to come back more times than not and in some way get a message across.
But it seems like it's a window of opportunity and that window at some point closes.
Does that make sense?
Yes, absolutely.
You're such an astute observer.
You know, I just read a book by Neal Donald Walsh, the last in his Conversations with God series, called Home with God in a Life that Never Ends, and I've only read the book twice.
I've not gotten through it the third time yet, but it has meant a lot to me.
And he talks about different stages of death, and I can't recall which stage he said, but he said in one of the stages, the first or the second, I would say I would bet you would enjoy that book.
It is very easy when you're still identified with your body and your mind to visit, to
reassure.
And I agree with him that our loved ones stop at nothing to let us know that they're just
fine, particularly if we'd like that connection with them.
And I would say I would bet you would enjoy that book.
It's meant a lot to me.
And there were answers in there that I had never been able to find.
And you're such a good observer.
That is exactly the truth.
Actually, I'm an experiencer, which makes it easier.
So you do believe there is this window.
Do you have any speculation, Doctor, on what it is that closes?
In other words, what changes do you suppose for the person on the other side?
Well, you know, now, understand that in a court of law, when I speculate like this, the defense attorney will always say, Doctor, stay in your area of expertise.
I'm sure he does.
But, you know, but, I'm talking with you.
I would say that just perhaps we continue to grow and evolve and change, perhaps, even after death.
And that maybe the reason that I don't know for sure.
of the connection are so common immediately after the death, within the days or weeks,
is that just maybe our loved one goes on to the next stage in their growth or development
in whatever they choose to be or to do then.
I don't know for sure.
I'm sure one day I will know.
A woman who had a very profound experience of her husband after death, when she had seen
him on the third day after his death, walked through the bedroom door and come up to her
and he spoke with her, reassured her that he was fine and talked with her about the
path of their children and their family.
Bye.
He said something to her that was so extraordinarily comforting and talked about the power of our thoughts.
He said, Honey, just remember this.
Just your thought of me will cause me to rush to your side.
So whenever you need me, think of me, and I'll be there.
And when I have heard other stories, people talking about how they were able to move through walls with the power of their thought, or to be with somebody with the power of their thought when they are in that out-of-body state, I thought to myself, How extraordinary.
Now I understand why masters say, control your thoughts.
Why is it not more reasonable to believe the Occam's Razor aspect of this?
And that would be that here we have a living, grieving, and I know a lot about grief, brain that is seeing what it wants to see or hearing what it wants to hear.
In order to protect itself.
We all know that the brain, I guess, when it's in great danger or great grief or great something or another, secretes protective something or another.
Hormones.
Hormones, yes.
So, why isn't there a perfectly acceptable medical scientific explanation for all of this?
I think there are no medical or scientific explanations.
I mean, perhaps we could say it's our imagination.
Perhaps we could say that we're making it all up.
But I can tell you this, people who have had these experiences are absolutely convinced that they were real.
And they also seem marked by such a profound sense of peace and knowing.
And the people have absolutely no need to tell others about them.
So, then we get right up to, we butt heads with this business of the mystery.
I don't know why more people don't have these, but I would say that our beliefs do shape our experience.
And if people say, these things are ridiculous, they're crazy, they're whatever, I just say, well, so be it.
That is what will be true for you.
I know that you just went through this with Ramona, and my own father died just two months ago.
I didn't lose a spouse, but losing a father was hard.
I can tell you that driving home on the day of his death from my parents, I was beside myself.
It was an hour drive, and I was so sad and couldn't believe it had happened.
For 30 or 40 minutes, I was just quiet in the car, and then I went, I can't deal with Punched on the radio, and a coincidence, perhaps, and I suppose nothing means anything except the meaning we give it, but what happened next really comforted me.
A song came on the radio by Martina McBride called, In My Daughter's Eyes, and it was the last verse, something that went like, I've seen the light, it's in my daughter's eyes.
I can see the future now, a reflection of who I am and what will be.
When I'm gone, I hope you'll see how happy she's made me.
And I mean, I just, my eyes just filled with tears and I just said, thank you, Dad.
And I was comforted by it.
Now.
Yeah, I know.
I had similar experiences and some really strange ones as well.
You're absolutely right.
I mean, there's nobody that can tell you anything otherwise once you've had the experience.
In my case, I'm going to give you absolute honesty here, Doctor.
I went into this incredible state of shock.
I mean just, God, I was in shock.
I just didn't know what I was doing.
I self-medicated myself.
I had some back medicine.
I took that.
It blunted everything.
I was still in shock.
And even through all of that, I had an experience where for a couple of days, I would get so cold.
I'm normally a person who keeps my house very cool.
Usually the wailing complaints of others who are near me, it's so cool.
However, even raising the temperature up 10 degrees above what I would normally find comfortable I was still chilled to the bone to the
point where I had to go jump in the shower let hot water pour on me and this chill just kept coming so
I felt Ramona was there and I could feel her so strongly so strongly and I'm sure if I hadn't been self-medicating
that I would have had much more of a message.
I mean, there was absolutely no question that something was happening to me.
There's no words that can properly convey this to other people.
I can just tell you, and I'm sure this is the way it's come out of other mouths of other people you've talked to, I just know she was there.
That's all there is to it.
I know she was there.
Yes.
And I know now when I think of her, she is there.
Yes.
This is one tough topic, but it's probably the most important topic we can talk about in life.
Dr. Janice Amatuzio is my guest, and she'll be back, and when she is back, we'll let all of you take a crack at her, as it were.
She's a lady who deals with the dead all the time.
She's a lady who speaks for the dead.
From Manila, in the Philippines, flip side of the world, I'm Art Bell.
So, very appropriate, right?
No point in fearing the Reaper.
He's going to come visit anyway, right?
My guest is Dr. Janice Amatuzio, and she's a coroner.
She speaks for the dead.
I think that's such an elegant way of describing that job, as one who speaks for the dead.
I've got a very interesting fast blast here from Dell in Bullhead City, Arizona, who says, could you please ask the good doctor what is the general consensus, or perhaps even just her opinion, in the medical community, her part of it, toward euthanasia?
Given her expertise and her knowing how painful and drawn-out some terminal diseases can be.
Now that's a question that I'll give her the opportunity not to answer in a moment.
I know it is a very, very controversial question, Doctor, so just before we get to the phone calls, this is the hour
where we go to the audience.
I do want to try and pose it, and you can just decline to answer it, but euthanasia, some terminal diseases really are just absolutely awful for the people going through it.
Now, how do you feel about that?
Oh, you know, I just don't condone suffering at all, and I see no point in suffering for suffering's sake.
I would say with good hospice care, with good medical care, I would say that I would do everything possible to keep somebody who's dying from a devastating disease comfortable.
I mean, that's what we're supposed to do, you know, is to care for our patients.
Okay, well does that sometimes mean giving on the part of a physician?
I think this goes on in America, around the world.
More times than not, or at least many times, giving a dose of something that the physician knows probably in his or her heart has some possibility of being lethal.
As you're trying to prevent pain, you're eventually going to get to that threshold, aren't you?
Yes, you do.
Now, understand that I don't treat the living.
Well I do understand, yes.
But I do investigate deaths in hospice, and the most important thing is for me to speak the truth about this.
That said, I think that sometimes the lines blur a bit, and we as medical examiners cannot always tell if a pain medication, when the level is high, if Whether or not that person, if they have been on that pain medication for weeks or months, the levels are extremely high sometimes because people develop a tolerance.
And what might be considered toxic in one person not accustomed to it may not be in somebody in hospice.
I've just ducked your question, as you know.
Well, in a way and in a way not.
In a way not.
I mean, after all, I guess if you look at it and you see what would be a toxic dose for somebody who had not taken the medication, but you're fully aware that they had a terrible terminal disease, and so it is a gray area, I suppose, but... I would say that virtually, I mean, in fact, all of the physicians that I know that work in this field with taking care of the terminally ill are so conscientious.
They realize that euthanasia is not acceptable and it's against the law in most states and so they do everything they can to keep their patients comfortable and to still do the best job they possibly can medically and ethically.
Well, I've heard from many physicians, doctor, I'm sorry to interrupt, that Americans in terminal situations are grossly under-medicated, that because of the fear of the DEA and other agencies that watch doctors very carefully, frequently not enough pain medication is given to somebody who's in a terminal situation.
That would not surprise me at all, and I can tell you my father Well, he was still feeling good, expressed those same concerns to me.
He said, you know, Janice, I think in medicine these days, sometimes we take better care of our animals than we do our people.
And he was referring to the fact that sometimes we put our animals down when they're suffering.
And I looked at him and I said, I know, Dad.
I agree.
But you know, you're really in a dilemma.
Because, you know, how does a physician handle this?
And the only choice the physicians have right now is to obey the law.
And so the only thing we can do is to change the laws.
But you've got some tough calls to make, Doctor.
My God, if you do an autopsy and you find a level of morphine that technically is lethal and you find, I don't know... Oh, let me give you an example.
The level is too high and the person was put on it yesterday.
Well, that's an easier call.
That's a much easier call.
Well, that sounds to me like an overdose.
But if the level is high, but they have been on it for weeks to months, it's still easy.
Because then we know that that person has developed a tolerance.
And we've got some superb forensic toxicologists.
I have one working in my office right now, Dr. Quinn.
We call her Quincy.
Who has subspecialty training in forensic toxicology?
Who can help us with those types of determinations?
I think the question you're asking has to do with the art of medicine and how to keep somebody comfortable.
And, you know, I think that those are questions, you know, does the doctor give more than they should?
Does the patient take more than they should?
Those are questions that are so personal.
And I think really not things that we can perhaps always mandate or always know.
We do the best we can as medical examiners to speak the truth.
But as the medical examiner in my area, all I ask with hospice cases is, were the medications taken appropriately?
And if the nurse says yes and the family says yes, We do not do post-mortem examinations on those cases.
Got it.
All right, doctor.
It's absolutely stacked full of people that would like to speak with you, so let's do it.
On the wildcard line, Ethel, you're on the air with Dr. Amatuzio.
Yes, doctor.
This is a very interesting program.
I'm a personal friend of Claire Sylvia who wrote the book, Change of Heart, and that was the movie that James Seymour starred in on Lifetime.
It was called Heart of a Stranger.
They changed the title, but it was based on her experience.
Since that time, she had another transplant, a kidney transplant.
She's doing fine.
She's a ballroom dancer.
We are both in the same Florida Follies, we both dance, and we've got a connection because I've had an experience.
I know that there's an afterlife because after 18 years being dead, my husband contacted me through automatic writing.
So I wrote a book, she wrote a book, and we exchanged books.
And what is the name of your book?
Thoughts from Heaven.
Tell me, was it comforting?
Oh, I absolutely am not afraid to die.
I just know what's going on there.
And since my husband died, I also lost a son.
And he was only 46.
He died of a heart attack.
And I have spoken to him also, as well as my parents, my grandmother.
Oh my gosh, and this was comforting to you.
Yes.
And as you say, I feel a lot of peace in my life.
Well, thank you very much for the call.
Now, Doctor, do you, some of the things that you say to these family members, do you say them, and I think we touched on this on the program we did previously, because you actually believe them or because you wish to comfort the family or both?
I think it's both.
I think it's really important that as a forensic pathologist and a physician That I do my best to tell them what the science of medicine can provide.
But from my father, I also learned that art of medicine.
And he always would say to me, you know, Janice, a compassionate heart opens the door to mystery.
And that's where I've come from.
I think that it doesn't matter what I think.
It matters what they think, the family members think.
And so I try to walk the talk, you know, keep an open mind and listen.
I think the kindest thing you can do is listen.
Okay.
West of the Rockies, you're on the air with Dr. Amatuzio.
Hi.
Hello.
Hello.
Is that me?
Yes.
Oh, hi.
Listen, I was really confused by the lady that committed suicide.
And even though she met her family, She chose to come back?
Yes, she chose to come back.
And let me tell you the rest of the story.
I'm sorry I forgot that.
She said, I came back.
It took me six months to heal.
I divorced my husband.
I straightened out my life.
And she had become a counselor now.
And she said, I had the opportunity now to take care of myself.
And she said, remember, a lifetime is a phenomenal gift.
So she had seen... But if she had stayed on the other side, you would have been with your family?
Yes, ma'am.
Oh, thank God.
Thank you.
I hope you're right.
I hope so, too.
Okay, you see, what we're dealing with here are people who, for example, have had suicides in their family.
And, you know, there's a religious aspect that says if you commit suicide, you will not see the ones that you love.
Yes.
Oh, I see.
I understand.
You know, even in old England, you know, suicide was against the law.
And that was where the word crowner, coroner, came from, because the crowner, the investigator of the crown, would come out and investigate the death.
And I think if he felt it was a suicide, he would confiscate all the property, sometimes even the wife, which wasn't a good thing.
Gosh.
First time caller on the line, you're on the air with Dr. Amatuzio.
Hi.
Hello, is this the first time caller?
Yes.
Yes, yes, indeed.
This is going to sound maybe really bizarre, maybe not to you because of what I've heard you discussing.
You say a lot of times that this is way out there and this is sort of like going way out on a limb.
For a medical professional, it certainly is.
Well, what I want to ask is, have you ever, Doctor, experienced a feeling of energy from any of these, well, so-called deceased people?
That's a very good question and I can tell you I have not.
What is fascinating to me is to have the privilege of being with the dead body and there is, I feel, absolutely no energy there.
Perhaps it is because I am so engaged in doing the best I possibly can to answer the
questions of what happened, or I have wondered to myself, perhaps the energy has gone
on or is elsewhere, but I've never experienced anything other than focusing
medically on figuring out what happened.
and speaking.
That comforts me personally, doctor, because I don't for one second want to think that a dead body has energy left in it of any sort.
Thank you very much.
That spirit, that life, that consciousness is now gone on to whatever.
To that great mystery, but certainly it's not still in the body.
West of the Rockies, you're on the air with Dr. Amatuzio.
Hi.
Hello, West of the Rockies.
Hello?
Yes, hello.
Oh, I was told it was the wild card.
No, you're on the west of the Rockies line, Lori, right?
Okay, yeah, Lori.
Hi, Art.
Hi.
And hi, Doctor.
Hello, Lori.
Hi.
My question was, I've always heard that when a person dies that you lose so many ounces or ounces.
Is that true?
Art and I talked about that a couple of years ago when I was on the first time.
I don't know.
I've never heard anything about that.
The thing I know is that after death, in most circumstances, our bodies start to disintegrate, to break down, and in dry environments, they'll start to dry, and so they'll become lighter.
I think I mentioned it to you the last time we did the program, Doctor.
There was a study back in the, I think, late 1800s in which they actually weighed a person about to die.
I'm not sure you could do such an experiment today.
But they did claim that three quarters of an ounce was lost at the very instant of death.
It was a legitimate medical study, and over the years I've had it and had it up on the website any number of times.
I don't think I can locate it right now, but you might do a little research into that.
It actually is an interesting question.
East of the Rockies, you're on the air with Dr. Amatuzio.
Hi.
Hi Art, this is Chris up in upstate New York.
Yes, hi.
At 1180 WAM up in Rochester.
Absolutely phenomenal show tonight.
Actually, I have a response for that last caller.
I know where that 21 grams goes.
My theory, and this has been, I did a senior thesis back in high school on post-life existence, basically what we're all talking about tonight.
And my theory is that our DNA structure basically is kind of like a radio frequency that emits
throughout the known universe at our point of death.
And throughout that, using Einstein's theory of relativity, and E equals MC squared, that
our mass of our DNA actually breaks down at the moment of death and is emitted throughout
the universe to the spiritual realm through quantum physics in order to...
Well, that's as good a theory as anybody else's.
Do you have any questions for the doctor?
Well, my question is actually, you know, if there is this other side, can we use it to our ability here and now?
Like, can we use our messages?
You know, my mother passed away three years ago and, you know, I've seen You know, animals or doves.
You hear Sylvia Brown talking about, you know, representations of all these, you know, symbols that go throughout our lives.
And can we use these and actually, you know, can they be enlightening?
Can they be life-changing?
Can they help us prevent previous tragedies, learn from history or whatnot?
You know, you would think that you and I had planned that question.
That is the subject of my second book, which just came out two weeks ago.
It's called Beyond Knowing, Mysteries and Messages of Death and Life, and it's really about taking these experiences, looking at the insights, kind of the hidden wisdoms in them, and applying them to our lives.
I mean, the knowledge that we already know this, the importance of trusting ourselves, the importance of realizing The energetic aspects, our ability to sense energy and to perceive our loved ones, the profound reassurance that there's no reason to fear and that all is well.
I have a sense that these insights have the power to reshape our thoughts and our beliefs and help lead us to a more meaningful, richer experience of life.
I think that the most important thing we can do is to Learn from these experiences.
And I don't say in the book how this would change your life.
I just say, you know.
And when you know, that changes everything.
The title of your most recent book again is?
Beyond Knowing.
And the subtitle is Mysteries and Messages of Death and Life from a Forensic Pathologist.
And I bet that's available at Amazon.com, bookstores, all over the place?
All the bookstores, Barnes & Noble.
I'll send you one, Art.
There you have it.
All right, Doctor, hold tight.
We're at the bottom of the hour.
This is a program that examines the kinds of things that you're hearing tonight called Coast to Coast AM.
Life reviews are very interesting things, and I've got something I want to say about life reviews.
What I've noticed is that as you get older, and I'm making my way, I'm 61 years of age now, I know I did some pretty nasty things when I was in my twenties.
I was pretty much a wild one, folks, when I was in my twenties.
And I did some things that I have regrets about.
I have sorrow about some of the things I did and some of the people I know I hurt.
There's no question about it.
That was when I was in my twenties.
And I've noticed that as I get older, I'm beginning to review these things and feel them very heavily.
Now, perhaps it's true that if you live long enough, you begin that process before you pass anyway.
And perhaps if you go when you're younger, you are thrust into that process.
Maybe you're thrust into that process no matter what, but it certainly seems that as you age, and I think a number of older people in the audience could probably confirm that you begin that process of life review anyway.
Maybe we'll get a comment on that from the doctor in a moment.
In my earlier years, as I mentioned, I know darn well I did some things that hurt people
and I did things that I'm sorry for.
And I've noticed in my latter years, and I can't even really exactly tell you when it began, but I've started doing a kind of a life review.
It's been underway for some time now.
Do you think that's normal, Doctor?
I think it is normal for anybody who is You told me you're an experiencer, and awareness, I feel, is one of those, you know, footsteps to mastery.
life is not worth living. I might have the author wrong on that, but you told me
you're an experiencer and awareness I feel is one of those, you know, footsteps
to mastery. Awareness is really experience plus knowledge and I would
say that once we begin to review and become aware of who we were being and
I think that's how we choose to live grand lives, because it's only when we can see what works and what doesn't that we progress.
And I think it's marvelous.
I think it's absolutely marvelous, and I don't know how many people actually do that.
I don't either.
I guess that's kind of why I said it, because maybe I want to know.
I want to know if it's kind of a natural process as you approach the autumn or you're in the autumn part of your life.
You know, people we know who have experienced clinical death have this instant life review, although it may not seem instant to them, because I think time is irrelevant.
But as we age, I think there is a natural, or at least for some of us, there is a natural tendency to begin a review of both the good and the bad, the regrets and the good times.
Wild Card Line 4, you're on the air with Dr. Janice Amatuzio.
Hi.
Hello?
Is this Wild Line?
Yes.
This is Kathy.
I just have a quick thing that I haven't ever heard anybody speak about before, but I didn't have a near-death experience, but I had a halfway one.
Wow!
I was taking a walk around my complex late at night, like 11 o'clock at night, and all of a sudden I started walking right out of my body.
Oh my!
And I was half in and half out.
And I thought, oh my God, what if somebody drives around here?
I couldn't move.
I didn't fall.
And I just stood there and I thought, I can leave.
I know that I can leave.
But I don't want to be in the parking lot.
Well, it sounds stupid, I know, but I don't want to be in the parking lot when I go, because I wonder what I'm doing out here at 11 o'clock at night, taking a walk.
So I stood there for about, thank God no cars came, so I stood there for about, I don't know, it seems like forever, but it was probably three or four minutes.
And I knew then there was no death, because I was totally myself, even though I was halfway out of my body.
I was totally aware of who I was.
So I thought, okay, I'm going to focus on my body and I'm going to come back in.
So I said to God, okay, just let me get home and then I'll go.
I don't want to go here.
So I focused on my hands and my feet and everything.
I was standing there and slowly I came back into my body.
I hadn't been ill or anything.
I hadn't been nothing.
That's a spontaneous out-of-body experience.
I know, I've had them before but never anything like half in and half out.
I walked back two blocks to my house, walked up the stairs and then I was fine.
So the next day I went to see an internist and he said, you have a heart murmur.
And he said, I'm amazed you didn't die.
Wow!
So I waited a couple of years and I watched it and checked and I finally had heart surgery.
But the thing is, after that I never had any fear.
Because I really knew, even though I'd had out-of-body experiences from meditating and all, and knew that, I had never had one where I was totally in control of it at that moment.
Okay.
Alright, well, there you have it, Doctor, echoing exactly what you said.
In other words, once you've had one of these, the fear of death is simply gone.
It's gone.
It's absolutely gone.
There's so much we can learn from that, you know.
I always say to myself, If it's true, then that would change everything.
And for many people, we don't even need to experience one to know.
We don't have to be experiential learners.
We can learn from others.
And I just do wonder how, if we really took that no fear into our hearts, I just wonder how that would change our lives, our planet, you know?
All right, let's try Charlene on the international line from Calgary, Alberta, Canada.
Hi there.
Hi Art.
Hello Janice.
Hello Charlene.
What a pleasure and an honor.
I wanted to say, first off, I'm a highly sensitive individual and I'm very tuned in, sometimes where it's just too hard to bear, but that's life.
It's a gift when it's wonderful.
My son's golden retriever named Rocco is the purest form of love I have ever known.
In my 52 years of life on this very harsh and challenging planet, he is my angel and he is my soulmate.
He's so touching.
And forevermore, I pray, if that's what he would want too, of course.
I'm not a selfish type with my pure love.
What I would like to know is this.
Janice, is it possible, do you think, for a human and an animal purity To be together after we pass on, whether we pass on at different times or together, I would love to know your opinion on that.
You know, my dog, the love of my life, Magic, died.
And about four weeks after his death, he awakened me by woof, woof, woof, woof, at the side of my bed because my husband was having severe chest pain.
It turned out not to be a heart attack, but a GI problem.
And I had a man also tell me about an experience of his where he... I wrote about it in the first book, Charlene.
He was in a tunnel.
He had left his body, and he saw his mother, his dad, his brother, and his dog, and the reunion was extraordinary.
And I would say that everything is possible, and that love you share will never end.
Well, Doctor, that takes us to another subject, which is animals and souls.
And I firmly believe, I completely believe that animals have souls.
I've said this so many times on the program, but you can look at an animal, be it a dog, a cat, or whatever the animal is, and you can see in it Jealousy, happiness, at times depression.
You can see just virtually every emotion, short of the ability to articulate them, that you see in a human being.
I agree.
I agree completely.
I have five dogs and five horses and there's no doubt in my mind.
Well, there you go.
Alright, we're so short on time.
First time caller on line, Nancy, you're on with the doctor.
Hello.
Hello.
I just wanted to tell you a few things that happened after my husband passed away.
This was four years ago and we had a lot of people at the house.
He passed away on a Thursday.
This was a Saturday and after most of the people left, I had a dog I had to put away because it would get excitable.
I took him outside and we walked around outside for a while.
Everything was quiet, and all of a sudden, this bird started singing.
Now, my husband and I were bird feeders.
We fed the birds, and I had never heard anything like this in my life.
I mean, it wasn't continuous.
It wasn't repetitive, like a lot of birds do.
This just went on and on, and I just had something.
It just went through me.
It hit me that this was him telling me that everything was okay.
And then, a little later, I have three daughters.
My second middle daughter came out, running out of the house, all excited.
She said she was in the bathroom, and all of a sudden she heard this kerplunk, and a penny fell to the floor at her feet.
Really?
Yes.
And then my youngest daughter, She had gone home.
She was engaged to be married in a couple months.
She called me up later that evening to find out how I was doing.
And she told me, she said, Mom, I have some things I have to tell you that happened.
She said, one of them has to do with a bird.
And I said, just a minute, is the other thing a penny?
And I said, just a minute, is the other thing a panty?
And she said, yes.
It's fun.
Well, she said they were, her and her fiance were standing out on the doorstep out in the
backyard.
And she had a wet shower, a wetting shower, and had this new mat she had put out there.
And they were standing there, and she said, this bird was making a real racket above them.
She said it was almost like it was trying to get their attention.
And she said they looked up, and it was just a blackbird sitting up there, but it just carried on.
And she said they looked up at it and it sat there for a couple of seconds and then flew away.
And then she looked down on the mat and she said her fiance had smoked a cigarette and some ashes fell on the mat.
She brushed them away and walked out in the yard a bit, came back and looked down.
There was a penny laying on the mat.
That's an amazing story.
That it would happen to two simultaneously like that.
And I've always felt there was some connection, Doctor, and this is really getting out there, between birds.
And it seems like they're messengers or harbingers or they tell you something about death that has just occurred or will is about to occur.
I don't know.
There's something about birds.
There's that wonderful story by Margaret Craven.
I heard the owl call my name.
It talks about a Native American tradition where when they would hear the owl, it would usually signify a period of transition of birth or death.
But I think it was Walsh who said that our loved ones stop at nothing to let us know they're just fine and probably use every means possible.
The means that would make meaning to us or be meaningful to us.
Well, it's either that, doctor, or our brains are concocting these things to make us comfortable.
I don't know.
Well, Einstein said imagination is more important than knowledge.
There you go.
Wild Card Line, you're on the air with Dr. Amatuzio.
Hi.
Hello.
Hi.
I am a blind woman, but so far I have a lot of experience I was visiting my kids, and my daughter, she set the alarm at like 6.30, and I woke up, and suddenly, lady standing right in front of me, in the white dress and all that stuff, and I said, are you an angel?
I said, yes.
I mean, no, she didn't say nothing, but she smiled, like a peaceful smile, but her Her face was kind of having a lot of pain or something.
So I used the angel and she smiled at me and she was trying to say something.
And my daughter, she got up and closed the door and suddenly she just appeared.
So I told my daughter, I said, I just saw an angel.
She said, I'm blind.
So anyway, when my mother died and I had a dream.
It was like an open field.
It was like some open valley.
And my mother was standing there.
She had a white jacket and a blue skirt.
And she said, you've got to take care of yourself.
And I said, Mom, where are you going?
I want to give you a hug.
And she said, she backed off.
And she said, now I've got to go.
And I said, where are you going, Mom?
Please come back and come back and say, I gotta go.
You be take care of now.
And I woke up.
It was a dream.
And my mother passed away.
Maybe it was a dream, and maybe not.
But these stories come to us across all lines.
We could sit here, Doctor, and we could take calls, and take calls, and take calls, and never run out of them.
There are so many of these stories that it seems to me nobody who does a serious investigation into this area can come away saying there's not something else, there's not something more.
There is something.
I agree with you.
It leaves one standing in awe at the foot of the mystery.
That's it.
Wild Card Line, you're on the air with Dr. Amatuzio.
Hi Art.
Hi.
It's such an honor to talk to you.
I have kind of a different spin.
I got a story.
My little brother, He was 23 years old.
He was taking some pain medication for about two years for some back pain, a football injury in high school.
He was found dead on the couch like a half-eaten hot dog in one hand and remote control on the other watching a football game.
And the strange thing about it is just like two months prior to his death, I had this, like, ominous, urgent feeling, and I didn't really understand it, but I knew I had to go and visit him.
So that's basically what I did, and I was able to spend, like, two weeks with him, and I got to know him.
I mean, he was my littlest brother, and I really didn't get to know him because I was out of the house.
I was in the Air Force.
And so I had a chance to spend a lot of time with him, got to know him quite a bit.
I got back to Tucson and two weeks after I got back I got a call from my grandfather telling me he had passed.
I just wanted to share that story and also I had a question for the doctor.
Have you heard of someone actually passing away from a minimal amount of pain medication?
Yes, I have.
Particularly if you're not accustomed to it.
There can be some adverse reactions.
I don't know how long your brother had been on them or the rest of the circumstances.
I don't know.
It sounds to me... What was it?
Autopsy done?
I'm sorry.
He's gone.
It didn't sound like he had been taking them... Well, no.
Wait a minute.
He said he had been taking them for two years, I believe.
Oh, maybe he did.
Yeah.
Yeah, I believe he did.
So... It might have been due to something else.
Certainly, the autopsy would normally, particularly in a case like that, an autopsy, it seems to me, would be done, would reveal the cause of death, correct?
Yes.
They would do toxicology, examine the heart, examine the brain, and attempt to answer the question of what really happened.
But that's quite an amazing story.
I think everybody has some psychic ability, and when we pay attention to it, it works.
I absolutely agree with that.
I'm not sure, Doctor, about life after death.
I'm still trying to make up my mind about that.
I certainly hope that it is so.
But with respect to the living human brain, no question whatsoever, we have abilities that we have not yet begun to explore, in my opinion.
Yes, I agree.
Alright, Doctor, again, the title of your latest book, give it one more time.
It's called Beyond Knowing.
Mysteries and messages of death and life from a forensic pathologist.
That would be you, Dr. Janice Amatuzio.
Doctor, thank you so much for being with us tonight, and I'm sure we'll do it again.
Thank you, Art.
What an honor.
Take care and good night.
Alright folks, from the flip side of the world, that's it for tonight.
Tomorrow night we will be back.
It will be yet another fascinating night.
We'll turn to another topic with Stephen Schwartz.
He's always quite something.
Consciousness and water.
I'm dying to see how that one's going to come together.