ALABAMA: CORONER – interesting to be the Coroner of a County, one must be a minimum of 25 years of age to seek election. And the Coroner and Deputy Coroners (who often times serves for free) are required to have 12 hours each and every year of continuing education “at the Coroner’s expense.”
SHERIFF – interesting, to be the Sheriff of a county, one must be a minimum of 18 years of age, a resident of the county for 1 day (prior to taking office), and bears no education requirement to seek election as Sheriff or any education requirements while serving the four year term as Sheriff. An 18 year old could command a force of 100 deputies and a jail of 75 plus employees with zero education requirements. At age 18 the Sheriff can’t legally buy cigarettes, buy alcohol or buy a gun.
CORONER – when a Coroner has been informed that a person has been killed or suddenly died under such circumstances as to afford a reasonable ground for belief that such death has been occasioned by the act of another by unlawful means, he must forthwith make an inquiry of the facts and circumstances of such death by taking sworn statements in writing of the witnesses having personal knowledge thereof. (Code of Alabama 15-4-1)
CORONER – when a Coroner has been informed that a person is dead in the county and that such person died without being attended or examined by a legally qualified physician, the corner SHALL FORTHWITH PROCEED TO THE PLACE WHERE THE DEAD PERSON IS LYING, examine the dead body to ascertain the cause of death. When a coroner is unable to determine the cause of death, he may summon any physician or surgeon, who shall make an external postmortem examination of the dead body and report his opinion of the cause of the death to the coroner in writing. (Code of Alabama 15-4-2).
CORONER – can make call for an inquest. Summon 6 persons to hear testimony to determine the cause of death and manner of death (natural, suicide, accidental, homicide or undetermined). Any witness who refuses to answer any question in relation to the cause of death, except on the ground that it may incriminate himself, is guilty of a misdemeanor and must be committed to jail by the coroner (Code of Alabama 15-4-5). Coroner has right to administer oaths (Code of Alabama 15-4-6).
The key responsibilities of Coroners in Alabama: (1) Investigating Deaths (2) Pronouncing Death (3) Scene Investigation (4) Taking custody of the body (5) Identifying and notifying next of kin (6) Death certificates (7) Reports (8) Autopsies (9) Sworn statements (10) Blood and Urine Samples (11) Property of the deceased
JOINT partnership with law enforcement, EMS and the hospital. One agency should not exclude the other agency and not move anything without a joint effort. The Coroner should not enter the scene until consultation with the investigating officer in cases that are homicides. Deaths where suicide or accident, law enforcement should not disturb the evidence until Coroner is allowed to see the evidence. Because it is the Coroner who signs the death certificate to rule suicide or accidental. So it is a team effort. In homicides, while the Coroner has to rules that it is a homicide it is law enforcement who is in charge of the homicide investigation. But it is jointly not separately.
DALE COUNTY – Former Dale County Coroner Woody Hilboldt and current Coroner John Cawley, along with Dale County Commission Chairman Steve McKinnon and members of the Dale County Commission, have teamed together and worked to make the Coroner’s Office a professional office. In Dale County, the Coroner has a county office. The Coroner Office is located behind the Dale County Jail. It is a professional office with enough cooler space for 6 bodies. It has an area for the coroner to be able to perform a thorough examination of a body. Should there be a requirement the family view the body, there is a place for the Coroner to place the body outside of the steel cooler area where it is more presentable for family viewing. The Coroner has a fixed and secure safe to retain property and evidence which is controlled, a computer for record keeping, prescribed coroner forms for medications, evidence, family to sign for funeral homes and funeral homes to sign for receipt of bodies, and a form for the Coroner to provide to the funeral home with information they will need to contact the family and for death certificate.
DALE COUNTY – has two vans for the Coroner Office. One remains in Ozark and one in Daleville. The Coroner has Deputy Coroner’s to assist and one is assigned in Daleville area to make response faster. And when a body has to be transported to Montgomery for medical examination by the State Medical examiner, they have a van for the transport but a second van to remain in the county for respectful transport of bodies that pass in the county while the other van is transporting to the state medical examiner. The Deputy Coroner’s are paid for each call they answer.
DALE COUNTY – part time clerical to help maintain proper record keeping.
DALE COUNTY – notifies the coroner IMMEDIATELY when they know they have a death.
HOUSTON COUNTY: the largest of the counties furnish the coroner nothing. The current Houston County Commission sold the van used by the Coroner. They contract with a transport service. The Coroner makes $18,000 per year but has to furnish his own vehicle and gas responding to calls. (Yet a county commissioner gets $3,000 a year to furnish their own vehicle but D3 Commissioner/Deputy Sheriff Ricky Herring draws the auto allowance but drives a Houston County Sheriff Department vehicle). The Coroner has to use the morgue at Southeast Health, who really does not want him to use the morgue. The Houston County Coroner has no Coroner Office and operates from his funeral home located in Dale County. Houston County furnishes no clerical staff for the Coroner and to my knowledge no funding for Deputy Coroner.
At the Houston Coroner request, contrary to Alabama law, the Houston County Coroner does not want to be notified until law enforcement is finished with the scene. Therefore there is no “SHALL FORTHWITH PROCEED TO THE PLACE WHERE THE DEAD PERSON IS LYING”. When the Coroner was furnished a van he would not transport a body to another funeral home and currently will not remain on the scene with a body if the family does not select the Coroner’s funeral home.
Houston and Henry County could join hands and place a morgue facility in Kinsey at Kinsey Fire Station to be used by Houston and Henry County. They are one judicial circuit and could share the expenses.
HENRY COUNTY: The Henry County Coroner has no morgue. Because he owns a funeral home he has to use the morgue of his funeral. He has complained to the former Henry County Commission Chairman about no morgue and should not be using the funeral home morgue but it fell on deaf ears. That is why the suggestion for Houston and Henry County to go into partners of a morgue at Kinsey Fire Station because that is at the Henry – Houston County line. The Henry County Coroner has gotten the hand me down Ford Expedition of the Henry County Engineer when he got new vehicles. Often times the vehicles has 150,000 miles when the Coroner gets it. However the current vehicle of the County Engineer is a Chevrolet Tahoe. A stretcher will not fit in a Tahoe so do not know what they will do. Since 2006 the Deputy Coroner in Henry County has been strictly volunteer. But current Henry County Probate Judge/Commission Chairman Ray Marler had a local bill passed where the Deputy Coroner is paid per call like in Dale County. Law Enforcement in Henry County calls the Coroner immediately when death is determined and the investigation is done jointly.
COFFEE COUNTY: When Scott Byrd was elected Sheriff of Coffee County and Arnold Woodham Coroner of Coffee County, the Sheriff embraced the Coroner. Sheriff Byrd assigned Coroner Woodham a vehicle equipped with a radio. Made an office in the Coffee County Sheriff Office for the Coroner. When a death is determined on Coffee County the Coroner is notified immediately. There is a morgue located in the basement of the Coffee County Courthouse but being relocated out of the courthouse.
GENEVA COUNTY: Geneva County furnishes the Geneva County Coroner a van not fit for use. The Coroner uses his own vehicle so he is sure he can make it to the scene. There is a morgue in the Geneva County Courthouse capable for 12 bodies. The morgue was obtained for 11 counties with Alabama Department of Public Health for a disaster which might occur in this 11 county area. Geneva County does furnish the Coroner with a office but no clerical staff. The Geneva County Coroner personally pays his Deputy Coroner on a per call basis if needed.
The Coroner is on call 7 days per week, 24 hours per day, 365 days per year. NO one ever makes an appointment to die. So the Coroner is notified without warning. Most often the Coroners are treated like red-headed stepchildren.
Coroners should be furnished vehicles to be used 24/7/365. Because there is equipment the coroner should always have. And again, no one makes appointments to die, so there are no warning when the Coroner is called. The Coroner has mandated duties to be done in partnership with agencies who have mandated duties.
