Coroner Stories

I recall years ago seeing people on television or out in public having important conversations on their cell phones. That was long before every teenager, grandparent, and civil servant succumbed to the technological appeal of staying connected with everyone other teenager, grandparent, and civil servant outside of North Korea. Back when ownership of a cell phone was the societal equivalent of driving a Mercedes. Now when I see three people seated at the Food Court having three independent cell phone conversations, it seems cell phone ownership has become the societal equivalent of riding a Huffy.

Back then, I always wondered what it must be like to have a job so important that a cell phone was critical. One of those jobs that required a person to be available at all times. Something impressive like a corporate executive, a Hollywood mogul, or a government agent.

Now that I have one—the job and the phone—I don’t wonder about that sort of thing anymore. Now I hate my phone. Keep in mind that 95% of the time that my phone rings it means that somebody has died. I’ve even developed an aversion to answering my phone at home. The only people that call my home phone tend to be telemarketers, but I guess every now and then I like to talk on something that doesn’t accelerate the growth of the tumor on the right side of my head.

I don’t even know why I keep the land line. It’s like a dog that never gets played with, but the owner keeps buying food for it every month. Maybe it’s because it doesn’t tear up the furniture or crap in the house when I’m out later than usual. Everyone knows they can connect directly to my hip 24/7 and I’ll answer unless I’m gloved up or in the shower. Come to think of it, I’ve worked plenty of scenes where both conditions applied. (See my post “Suicide Foresight.�?)

The best part about cell phones–besides the fact I haven’t paid a cell phone bill in years–is that just about every cop has a cell phone. Gone are the days of trying to return a call to a private residence and getting a busy signal for an hour at 3 a.m. because the family has the phone tied up. The police are also able to use their cell phones instead of their radios on certain scenes in order to keep the media from hearing about the incident over their police scanners. Inevitably some citizen sees all the police activity and calls the local station’s “When you see news happen�? hotline using their cell phone.

For anyone going in to this line of work, I have a bit of advice–be sure you get the optional phone insurance. I’ve noticed that the smaller the cell phones get, the fewer impacts against the bedroom wall they seem able to withstand.

I suppose everyone at one time or another has learned of something that in retrospect they realized they could have gone their whole life without knowing. For some, it may have been an embarrassing family secret they were privy to. For others, calculus—or in my case, basic algebra—may be the one thing they considered to be useless knowledge.

Over the years, this job has provided countless opportunities for me to wish I had remained ignorant of information that I had been presented with. Technically, these details were knowledge, but not in the sense that they were of any practical use. The most recent example of one of these opportunities occurred just last week.

I spent the better part of an afternoon reading through police reports, child welfare reports, and witness statements pertaining to the latest child death I had to investigate. Without going into specifics, the information contained therein chronicled a pattern of abuse that would have lead any reasonable person to conclude that death for this particular child was inevitable.

Granted, all deaths are inevitable, but most of us are afforded the opportunity to live long enough that we are able to comprehend the concept of mortality. This particular child barely lived long enough to comprehend the concept of sitting up, but spent the last several months of its life in a vegetative state that prohibited it from doing so.

After reading the particulars of the case, I couldn’t help but wonder, “What good did that do me?” Sure, I was able to determine the circumstances surrounding the critical injury that the child received. But beyond that, knowing detailed information about the day-to-day life of the child, the way it was treated, and the way the parents acted was of little use to me.

When I first started investigating deaths, having special knowledge of restricted details surrounding a case was one of the more enjoyable aspects of this job. Family and friends were eager to know what they hadn’t seen on the news or read in the papers. There have even been times when this knowledge has been downright amusing. To this day, there is nothing better than watching a reporter on the news give details that aren’t even close to what really happened, or to watch them try and create a story out of the scant details that the police spokesperson has provided.

Most everyone has watched (or avoided watching) news stories about some heinous act committed against a child on the evening news. These segments are usually limited to 45 seconds, so the reporters can only hit the high points and seem eager to use shocking keywords like “sodomy” and “child pornography” that are more likely to attract an audience. These generic terms are easily understood by the general public and elicit comments from viewers such as, “How could someone do that to a child?” or “I hope they rot in jail!”

Regardless of the impact such stories have on us initially the truth is that unless the story is particularly shocking, we forget it in no time at all. Even producers seem to move on when the next big story comes along. I’ve often wondered how much more of an impact these stories would have on viewers if the reporters were to pass on the specific details of the case. Maybe passing on such details to the general public would educate those among us that don’t realize grabbing a baby by its ankles and swinging it against the bedroom wall like a baseball bat is an inappropriate form of punishment. Those people are out there, and they are not all “drugged up” at the time of the incident. Some are just that stupid.

I find myself wondering, “What have I gained from this knowledge?” Did I develop a more loathsome opinion of those that resort to violence against defenseless children rather than use basic coping skills I used to assume were innate characteristics of being human? Not really. That bar has been set pretty low for quite some time.

I wonder if the child had any awareness that it was in a vegetative state. I wonder if the child was sad about being in such a state or simply relieved to have been out of an abusive environment no matter what the conditions. I wonder these things, and others, but not for very long. The sad fact is that, no matter how in-depth my knowledge of this case may be, it is only a matter of time before it too slips away into the mental abyss of details of the hundreds of cases that came before it.

When I talk to people about death investigation, I usually don’t go into a lot of detail about things I have done or seen. Their imagination seems to have given them a much more graphic impression about what my job entails. Most everyone assumes the job is stressful simply because of the routine exposure to traumatic and unnatural deaths. I used to assume the same, but I have since learned that one of the most stressful aspects of this job has nothing to do with gore.

When I first started out, one of the most appealing aspects of death investigation was the element of unpredictability. I never knew where and when the next death was going to occur or what the circumstances surrounding the death were going to be.

This aspect also leads to a great deal of variation from day to day. Some days are non-stop and seemingly never ending as I go from one death to the next. Many times I’ve gone all day without a single death being reported, and within minutes of crawling into bed I’ve been called with multiple scenes on opposite sides of the city that have kept me out the rest of the night. Most days I may not have to do anything during my shift. That sounds great—for me and for the public at large—but sitting around essentially waiting for someone to die is an awkwardness that escapes description.

Never knowing what I was in store for on any given day was once the most exciting aspect of this job, but it wasn’t long before the “honeymoon�? was over. Now the most exciting aspect has become the most annoying aspect.

Years later I find myself fantasizing while I’m driving to a self-inflicted shotgun wound at three in the morning. I fantasize about what it must be like to be a normal person with a normal job. The kind of person that goes to sleep after the 11 o’clock news and—bladder notwithstanding—stays asleep until the alarm goes off in the morning. The kind of person that goes to work and comes home from work at the same time everyday. The kind of person that when they get home, they stay home. I even find myself fantasizing about what people with normal jobs fantasize about.

Blood and guts aside, death investigation was—and continues to be—the antithesis of what I consider to be a “normal�? job. The kind of job where a person produces something tangible or at the very least goes to work with established tasks to accomplish. Instead I feel like an auto mechanic that was hired to respond to every car breakdown in the city wherever and whenever one occurs. Like a conventional auto mechanic, I can make diagnostic impressions, but unlike an auto mechanic, every vehicle I look at is beyond repair.

To tell the truth, I’ve never really stopped to consider my true thoughts or “feelings�? on coping with child deaths, much less compile them into a cohesive form. That said, this post should be as new to me as it is to anyone who reads it.

Not everyone deals with child deaths the same way. It’s been my experience that there are three major classifications that people fall into. Here’s a quick breakdown:

Class A: These are the people that are overly affected by child deaths. They become emotionally involved on some level with every child death and in some cases take the death too personally. It affects their mood at work as well as at home. Class A people are most likely to develop physical and psychological problems as a result of their coping method.

Class B: These are the people that are somewhat affected by child deaths. For the most part, they do a good job of leaving their work at work, but on occasion are known to have a “spillover�? occur. Class B people are usually aware of when they are being affected by child deaths and take steps to compensate. Compensation usually involves gravitating toward the coping methods of the other two classes.

Class C: These are the people that aren’t affected by child deaths. They can work numerous child deaths with a focused, workmanlike attitude and give the task no more thought than any other aspect of their job. They spend most of their time oblivious to the tragedy that the death involves. Class C people are probably more affected than they realize.

On second thought, maybe I have put some thought into this subject.

As for myself, I suppose I bounce around in the B to C range with most of my time spent in C. If I spend any time at all thinking about child deaths, I focus mostly on how little they seem to affect me and on my subsequent fear that one day I’m going to snap and take a hostage.

As it stands, I do a pretty good job of avoiding the significance of child deaths. The only time I ever think about the subject is when someone else brings it up. The typical scenario is when someone asks whether or not I was involved with the investigation of a given case. I’ll respond accordingly, and invariably—regardless of whether I was involved in the case at all—the person responds with some variation of “That was so sad.�? My typical response is short and to the point, “Yes, it was.�?

It seems to me to be the polite response–the response they are expecting. They certainly don’t want to hear me say, no matter how sincerely, “You know, I hadn’t thought of that�? any more than someone who asks “How’s it going�? really wants to hear about how bad things actually are.

A few years ago, an intern at our morgue became upset over a child death. I can’t recall the particulars of the death itself as to whether it was a violent or “natural�? death. She was the type that would have gotten upset just as easily over either one. What stands out so distinctly in my mind is how upset she was and how willing she was to share her thoughts. Within only a few short moments one of the pathologists had heard enough.

“If you can’t observe and be quiet, then get out! You’re starting to depress the s - - - out of the rest of us.�?

I was glad the pathologist said something as I was getting a little upset myself. A few more minutes and I would have done the same (I’ve certainly done it since then). The intern’s feelings were valid, but to those of us taking an active role in the examination it was an unnecessary distraction. We didn’t feel the need to weigh in as to whether we thought the child looked like she had been a happy baby.

I apologize if my way of dealing with child deaths has given the impression that I’m a cold-hearted bastard. I’m certainly not suggesting that my “method�? for coping would work for everyone. It seems completely rational to me and has served me well. As proof, I haven’t felt the need to purchase a high-powered rifle and head to the nearest clock tower.

I can only provide two nuggets of advice that can be universally applied:
1. Find whatever means of coping works for you and run with it.
2. If you can’t find a means for coping early on, then pursue something else.

Initially, I had intended to provide some practical advice for others to use, but it occurs to me that I haven’t provided much of a formula for coping with child deaths. I suppose if I were a psyhciatrist, I would propose the more accurate title of “Avoiding Coping with Child Deaths.�? But I’m not. Those people are crazy…

I’ve noticed a lot of sites with a list of unique things the author has done. In the interest of fitting in, here’s my compilation. As a death investigator, I supppose there are many things I’ve done that most people haven’t, so I’ll try to include things most people haven’t thought of…

1. Taken a deceased child from the arms of a grieving mother or father.
2. Done the above dozens of times.
3. Amassed more photos of naked people on my work computer than most people have on their home computer.
4. Driven a car with a dead body across the hood.
5. Collected and assembled the shattered remains of a 3-year-old’s head in order to figure out where it had been shot.
6. Climbed a tree to cut down a body.
7. Been stopped for speeding and given an apology instead of a ticket.
8. Examined a dead dog for signs of smoke inhalation.
9. Crawled about 50’ into a sewer pipe to drag out a body.
10. Been stopped by the state police with thousands of dollars worth of illicit drugs in the front seat and released (unrelated to #4).

I may add to this list in the future as I recall any more “out of the ordinary” stuff.