Coroner Stories

My apologies to anyone who may have been expecting, “The Girl of My Dreams—Part III.�? I’m afraid there isn’t one. Part of the reason I ended “Part II�? so abruptly with numerous questions left unanswered was to illustrate the fairly routine lack of closure associated with this job. Additional apologies for the delay in completing this post, as I hadn’t meant to delay the explanation this long.

I’ve long since become accustomed to this particular aspect of the job, so I suppose it affects the people I know even more. For every “remarkable�? or unusual case I work, I may mention the particulars to a few people. If these few people are curious enough, they naturally ask me about the outcome of the case down the road.

I always feel like I’m somehow disappointing friends, family, and police officers when they ask questions like:

“What was the little girl’s cause of death?�?

“Isn’t it a homicide if she died because of neglect?�?

It’s at that point I’m forced to admit that I have no idea what the ultimate outcome was on a case.

Here’s why:

Once I’ve done the scene investigation and prepared the paperwork, my role in the investigation is for the most part completed. Unless the case requires some immediate follow up work at the time of the autopsy, I’m pretty much done with the case as soon as I inform the respective agency as to what our findings were. The dynamics are a little different on a homicide case, requiring more work to collect evidence and more conversations with the respective agency about the particulars of the case.

So beyond the day after the autopsy, there’s a very good chance that I’ll never have any involvement with a particular case again. Many of our cases require further investigation such as toxicology and histology. These additional tests mean that it could be months before the pathologist determines a cause of death. During this span of time, I will likely have brought in several dozen more cases.

When a case is finally closed, it’s basically a clerical matter that is handled in the front office and nothing that I ever see again unless I go and check. Unless I’ve remained in contact with the investigating agency or seen an update on the news, I may never know the final determination on a case.

I’m not sure if I ever knew what the little girl’s cause of death was. I don’t remember her name, but I recall enough of the details that with a little effort I could pull her case and find out. But then I think, in the grand scheme of things, “What difference would that make?�?

Of course, that only explains why I don’t know the cause of death. As for what happened to the parents and whether she died from neglect—I can’t explain those at all. I can only assume that the case workers from child welfare arrived shortly after I left. Whether or not anything positive came from their visit is a separate issue. Neglect isn’t a pathological finding discovered at autopsy and is generally an issue for the judge, jury, and attorneys to sort out. To a certain degree, I’d rather remain blissfully ignorant on both issues.

So how do I answer those questions from friends and family? I typically don’t. I’ll offer something along the lines of, “I forgot all about that one,�? and politely pretend to be as curious as they are as to what the answer might be. Depending on the case, that may or may not be a true statement, but it’s a lot easier that explaining all I’ve written here. I’m pretty sure no one wants to hear the sad truth–that for every case that sticks out in my mind, there are a hundred that I forget completely.