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Speaker 1: Body Bags with Joseph Scott Morgan. Over the course of

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Speaker 1: my career, I spent a lot of time working for

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Speaker 1: the corner or working with corners and training corners all

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Speaker 1: over the United States. Now is a college professor. I

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Speaker 1: study them, but many people don't know anything about that office.

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Speaker 1: It's ancient and old. I'm Joseph Scott Morgan and this

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Speaker 1: is Body Bags back with me again. It's my good

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Speaker 1: friend Jackie Howard, executive producer of Crime Stories with Nancy

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Speaker 1: Grace that we're gonna talk a little bit about corners today. Well,

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Speaker 1: you're gonna have to school me, Joe, because we know

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Speaker 1: there are corners, and we know there are medical examiners.

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Speaker 1: So which do you want to talk about first? To

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Speaker 1: explain to me what they are and what's the difference.

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Speaker 1: We got to start with corners, Jackie, because it's it's

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Speaker 1: one of the biggest questions that that folks, you know,

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Speaker 1: they want to know, you know, what is a corner

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Speaker 1: because many people don't know. Uh, And of course you know,

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Speaker 1: it's like any great story, and trust me, the story

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Speaker 1: of corners is fascinating. Um, you got to start at

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Speaker 1: the beginning. I gotta tell you, you you know, the first

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Speaker 1: time I ever heard the term, you know, when it

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Speaker 1: was Jackie. I was actually a high school student. And

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Speaker 1: in my high school they offered a course that was

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Speaker 1: called fan Intology, and I didn't really know what it was,

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Speaker 1: and I took it as an elector. Hey that again,

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Speaker 1: it was called what fan antology? Fan and yes, th

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Speaker 1: h a n okay okay fan fan intology And actually

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Speaker 1: it's the study of death and all things involving death.

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Speaker 1: We got to go to graveyards, we got to go

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Speaker 1: to funeral homes, and you know, it kind of started

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Speaker 1: an interest on my part about, you know, what was

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Speaker 1: this world all about? And I heard them talking about

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Speaker 1: the term corner and I didn't know what it meant.

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Speaker 1: I just knew that it had something to do with

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Speaker 1: the dead, and and through my own you know, kind

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Speaker 1: of elementary reasoning at that point in time, I thought, well,

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Speaker 1: corner probably has something to do with the heart, you know,

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Speaker 1: like coronary artery. I couldn't be further from the truth.

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Speaker 1: And you have to go all the way back to

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Speaker 1: uh to a time in England before there was a

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Speaker 1: Great Britain. It was actually the country of England, a

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Speaker 1: standalone country all the way back to the times of

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Speaker 1: Alfred the Great, one of the first kings of England,

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Speaker 1: and there is evidence at the term corner was mentioned,

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Speaker 1: but it wasn't actually the word corner. They actually were

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Speaker 1: referred to back then as crowners. And over the years

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Speaker 1: that term evolved from the word crowner to corner. And

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Speaker 1: why why crowner? I think that a lot of people

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Speaker 1: would scratch their heads and wonder, well, they were actually

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Speaker 1: the representatives of the crown, and they were they were uh,

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Speaker 1: they were there to hear the please. It was called

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Speaker 1: hearing the please of the Crown, if you will, And

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Speaker 1: there were these three nights that were assigned to this duty.

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Speaker 1: They would travel around and they would essentially work as

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Speaker 1: kind of de facto death investigators, trying to figure out

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Speaker 1: what had happened in that environment. But there their purpose

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Speaker 1: was not to necessarily solve crimes or try to find

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Speaker 1: out rationales. It was to collect money. And that's you know,

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Speaker 1: some people point to this period of time is when

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Speaker 1: the death tax actually began to to be enforced and

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Speaker 1: to take place. And I think I have a lot

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Speaker 1: of people that have come to me over the years

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Speaker 1: and they'll say, you know, we've heard that it's illegal

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Speaker 1: to commit suicide, and that that had actually been on

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Speaker 1: the books at some point time. And you know, interestingly enough,

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Speaker 1: it was declared at one point in time that it

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Speaker 1: was in fact illegal to commit suicide. But it had

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Speaker 1: nothing to do with, uh, the destination of your eternal

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Speaker 1: immortal soul, as a lot of people think that it

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Speaker 1: had some kind of connection to the church. The thing

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Speaker 1: was was that back during these times, if an individual

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Speaker 1: took their own life, that means that if this could

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Speaker 1: be proven, then every bit of property that they had,

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Speaker 1: guess where it would go, it would be forfeited to

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Speaker 1: the crown so they could collect. So there was like

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Speaker 1: a motivation on the parts of these representatives of the

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Speaker 1: crown to go out and certainly make a determination about

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Speaker 1: to cause death. I really wonder all those years ago,

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Speaker 1: if they kind of listed towards a manner of death

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Speaker 1: that would have been qualified as suicide because all the money,

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Speaker 1: all your property, all your livestock would be taken, and

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Speaker 1: it didn't matter what station you held in life, so

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Speaker 1: it would be reverted over to the crown. And uh,

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Speaker 1: you know, you go forward, you know a few years

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Speaker 1: from there, and uh, people have heard of Richard the lionhearted. Uh, well,

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Speaker 1: he was kind of he's kind of the the if

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Speaker 1: you will, the spiritual Father, I guess, if you will,

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Speaker 1: or this ancient person that existed during that period of

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Speaker 1: time that kind of formalized the office of crown or

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Speaker 1: slash corner because he was all fighting crusades and he

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Speaker 1: was not getting money or revenue from the sheriff's You've

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Speaker 1: heard of the evil Sheriff of Nottingham and the robin

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Speaker 1: Hood legacy and that that can be traced back to

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Speaker 1: that period of time and evil King John that was

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Speaker 1: in place of King Richard. Well, King Richard needed a

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Speaker 1: source of funds and so he would send these crowners

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Speaker 1: out to collect money on his behalf so he could

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Speaker 1: continue to prosecute these crusades and ransoms and all of

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Speaker 1: these things that we're taking place during that period of time.

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Speaker 1: But after period of time, the office began to evolve

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Speaker 1: and it just became part and parcel of English common law,

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Speaker 1: and still to this day it exists. There's certainly a

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Speaker 1: quite a few years between those days and these. So

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Speaker 1: what does a corner do and how does a corner

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Speaker 1: get into office? Yeah, it's gonna it's gonna vary, uh

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Speaker 1: from from state to state essentially what the requirements are

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Speaker 1: going to be to be a corner. And still roughly

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Speaker 1: about half the states in the United States still hold

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Speaker 1: on to this office of corner. Remember when the British colonies,

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Speaker 1: you know, and you know, you think back to the

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Speaker 1: Massachusetts Bay Colony and these sorts of things. They didn't

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Speaker 1: just leave England behind. They brought English common law with them.

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Speaker 1: And so when they brought all of these offices together

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Speaker 1: and kind of backing up a little bit, that ancient document,

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Speaker 1: the Magna Carta, people don't realize how old these offices are. Actually.

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Speaker 1: I think it's like in the twenties of a paragraph

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Speaker 1: of the Magna Carta. You can still see it if

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Speaker 1: you look at a copy of it. The word sheriff, bailiff,

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Speaker 1: and corner are all mentioned in the same line. That's

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Speaker 1: how old these offices are. And it goes back and

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Speaker 1: this goes back to the early twelve hundreds when the

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Speaker 1: Magna Carta was instituted, and so that law came over

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Speaker 1: to the to the US or to the colonies at

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Speaker 1: that point in time because they had no other framework

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Speaker 1: to kind of go off of you know, so they

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Speaker 1: were going to maintain this. And so the corners in

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Speaker 1: in the US as we see them now essentially evolved

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Speaker 1: from those early days. And you can go from state

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Speaker 1: to state and every now and then you'll come across, uh,

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Speaker 1: these weird kind of what we referred to as amalgams

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Speaker 1: of corners and medical examiners and all these sorts of things,

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Speaker 1: and it's really it gets confusing. But just so folks understand,

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Speaker 1: there in many states, and not all, but in many states,

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Speaker 1: there is no real educational requirement for a corner And

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Speaker 1: that's one of the knocks against the system that if

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Speaker 1: you go to run for the office of corner um,

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Speaker 1: that you don't have to be particularly degreed in a

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Speaker 1: certain area. But I'll give you an example. As everybody knows,

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Speaker 1: I started my career in Louisiana. Well, Louisiana is a

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Speaker 1: corner state. That means that each one of the parishes,

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Speaker 1: which are like counties, has its own corner. But in

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Speaker 1: that state, in order to run for the office, you

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Speaker 1: have to be a physician. You have to be a

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Speaker 1: medical doctor in order to run for that office. But

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Speaker 1: you go to other states, and in some places they

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Speaker 1: require nothing more than a G. E. D. In order

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Speaker 1: to run for that office. So there's a desperate difference

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Speaker 1: between the level of education. Uh, that's going to vary

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Speaker 1: from state to state in many cases, and and that

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Speaker 1: can that can leave the population wanting, you know, as

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Speaker 1: far as thorough death investigations. And then on top of that,

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Speaker 1: some states require corners to have formal training, and in

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Speaker 1: other states they essentially say, good luck, here's the book

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Speaker 1: of the laws, best of luck to you, I hope

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Speaker 1: you do well, and they give very little training. And

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Speaker 1: so that's a problem nationwide that has been identified over

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Speaker 1: the years. One of the tragic things here is that

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Speaker 1: many people never really, never really fully appreciate what the

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Speaker 1: corner does until perhaps a corner or corner investigator shows

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Speaker 1: up at their doorstep to deliver them individually bad news.

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Speaker 1: Can you imagine that's the first time you ever hear

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Speaker 1: about a corner and then suddenly you're kind of plunged

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Speaker 1: into this world where you have to understand what the

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Speaker 1: office does and what they what service they're supposed to

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Speaker 1: provide to families once you get elected. Is there a

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Speaker 1: class A certification? I mean, are you telling me there's

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Speaker 1: nothing in some jurisdictions that I have to do other

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Speaker 1: than run for office. Yeah, in certain jurisdictions, uh, Jackie,

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Speaker 1: it is mandated that you have to go to, say,

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Speaker 1: for instance, in certain jurisdictions, a two week course in

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Speaker 1: order to be up to speed with the laws and

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Speaker 1: the basics of medical legal death investigation. But when you

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Speaker 1: compare that level of training to say, for instance, what

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Speaker 1: a physician has to go through that might become a

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Speaker 1: medical examiner, we can get into that there's a huge

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Speaker 1: gulf of of disparity relative to education and being a

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Speaker 1: tune to what the form and function is of the office.

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Speaker 1: And you know, we kind of have to understand what

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Speaker 1: does a corner do. Well, they're actually we're fer two

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Speaker 1: officially as the certifier of death. You know when you say, God,

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Speaker 1: that sounds kind of odd. What does that mean? Well,

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Speaker 1: they're the person that first off can validate to death

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Speaker 1: to say that this individual has in effect died all

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Speaker 1: right in this local community. And that's going to vary

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Speaker 1: from place to place. Some states required that a physician

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Speaker 1: actually go to the scene or that the body be

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Speaker 1: brought to a physician and they declare death, whereas in

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Speaker 1: certain locations the corner can declare death at a particular

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Speaker 1: moment in tom so it's going to be heavily dependent

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Speaker 1: upon state laws. But once that has taken place, it's

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Speaker 1: the ball is going to be completely in the court

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Speaker 1: of the corner to make a determination as to what's

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Speaker 1: going to happen after that. And their role is to determine,

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Speaker 1: first off, what the manner of death is. And you've

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Speaker 1: heard me mentioned this before, and we have five of them,

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Speaker 1: which is natural, uh, we have homicide, accidental suicide, and

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Speaker 1: then the fifth one that's kind of nebulous, is called undetermined.

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Speaker 1: And if you'll kind of imagine those five manners of

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Speaker 1: death as a gigantic umbrella. The next the next step

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Speaker 1: that corners have to do is determine what the cause

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Speaker 1: of death is, so that you know that's gonna be

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Speaker 1: things like, um, say, an acute mio cardial infarction, which

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Speaker 1: is you know, it's it's medical ease for a heart attack. Okay,

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Speaker 1: part of the heart muscle dies as a result of

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Speaker 1: a blockage. Okay, Well, many people in this country. A

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Speaker 1: matter of fact, the number one killer in our country

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Speaker 1: is actually heart disease. All right, Most people are going

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Speaker 1: to succumb to that. But the question is, can someone

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Speaker 1: let's say, for instance, let's take uh, let's take an

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Speaker 1: acute m I as it's referred to in the vernacular.

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Speaker 1: Can someone die of a heart attack and that be

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Speaker 1: classified as something other than a natural death? Well, the

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Speaker 1: question is, yeah, yeah, that can happen. I've actually handled

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Speaker 1: a case where an individual shocked and old man by

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Speaker 1: you know, putting a shotgun in the old man's face,

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Speaker 1: and the guy had a heart attack and died, and

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Speaker 1: that young man was tried for murder and was convicted.

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Speaker 1: So yeah, that can happen. It can't happen. But more commonly,

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Speaker 1: you know, we begin to think about things like, well,

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Speaker 1: gunshot wounds, Well, what classifications can gunshot wounds fall under? Well,

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Speaker 1: we've got certainly homicide, we've got suicide, and then we've

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Speaker 1: got accidental, and then you might have undetermined. So it's

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Speaker 1: up to the corner to make a determination as to

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Speaker 1: which one of these categories, uh, that the cause of

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Speaker 1: death is going to fit under relative to manner. And

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Speaker 1: this can get pretty complicated, particularly when you have cases

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Speaker 1: that go back years and years and years where you

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Speaker 1: have a real hard time trying to come up with

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Speaker 1: the specifics of what happened, and over a period of time,

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Speaker 1: the individual may for instance, be layered over with other

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Speaker 1: disease process that have had up. And one of the

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Speaker 1: things that impacted me the most, I think, when I

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Speaker 1: was a very young corner investigators, I actually assisted in

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Speaker 1: the autopsy of a gentleman that had been in a

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Speaker 1: nursing home since I think it was like ninety six

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Speaker 1: State Side, and he had been in there since he

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Speaker 1: was like twenty. I believe he finally died in the eighties.

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Speaker 1: And he had been paralyzed essentially from his waisted down

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Speaker 1: or from his mid abdomen down, and had constant care

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Speaker 1: over all these years. And Jackie, one of the tragic

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Speaker 1: things about this is that the reason this gentleman had

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Speaker 1: wound up in the nursing home to begin with was

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Speaker 1: the fact that he had sustained a gunshot wound all

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Speaker 1: those years back, multiple decades back, you know, where he

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Speaker 1: sustained that gunshot wound at the Battle of the Bulge,

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Speaker 1: and that round had actually lodged in his spine against

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Speaker 1: his spinal spinal cord and had paralyzed him. And they

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Speaker 1: didn't have the ability to extricate that round. They fig

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Speaker 1: here that it would cause greater harm. And you know that,

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Speaker 1: all of those years later, even though he had been

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Speaker 1: in a nursing home, the corner at that time ruled

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Speaker 1: his death, ruled his death as a homicide. And so

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Speaker 1: I was always fascinated by that. And I remember distinctly

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Speaker 1: being there present for the autopsy and I physically removed

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Speaker 1: that projectile from his spine, and there I was holding

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Speaker 1: holding that piece of history in my hand. And you know, now,

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Speaker 1: all of these years later, I think about how everything

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Speaker 1: that you do in life, many times relative to death investigation,

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Speaker 1: is going to impact the future going forward. So the

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Speaker 1: corner has to be equipped to analyze every bit of

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Speaker 1: this data that comes in, particularly is that applies to

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Speaker 1: people's medical histories and all this. Keep in mind, contrary

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Speaker 1: to what you see on television, homicides only make up

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Speaker 1: a very very small percentage of the deaths that corners

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Speaker 1: and even medical examiners work. Uh, the line share of

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Speaker 1: the deaths are going to be some kind of natural,

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Speaker 1: natural disease pathology. So you have to be really attuned

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Speaker 1: to natural disease and kind of how it impacts the

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Speaker 1: population at large. Joe, You're making me shake my head

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Speaker 1: because it's just kind of mind boggling knowing that there

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Speaker 1: are different regulations depending on where you live. So you

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Speaker 1: could have a tremendous corner one who is highly qualified

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Speaker 1: to handle death scenes, or you could have Joe blow

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Speaker 1: off the street who just has a G E. D.

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Speaker 1: What do we do with this knowledge? Yeah, well, first off,

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Speaker 1: let me qualify what I'm about to say by saying this.

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Speaker 1: I've trained a lot of corners over the course of

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Speaker 1: my career, and I have to say many, um many

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Speaker 1: of the best corners death investigators that I've ever worked

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Speaker 1: with were people that were absent some kind of high

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Speaker 1: flung college degree. They were just good common sense people

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Speaker 1: that understood practical application. And when it comes down to

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Speaker 1: a death investigation is is practical common sense knowledge that

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Speaker 1: the trick is understanding and learning. You have to be

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Speaker 1: self taught in a lot of these areas about everything.

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Speaker 1: I mean everything from from natural disease pathology like we mentioned,

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Speaker 1: to toxicology, uh to even d n A and you know,

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Speaker 1: and even even the greatest physicians that are out there

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Speaker 1: are not necessarily schooled in all of these areas and

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Speaker 1: and much of the time, it comes down to how

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Speaker 1: motivated the corner is that is in office, and how

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Speaker 1: many resources they have. And sadly, Um, sadly, one of

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Speaker 1: the problems is is that for many corners is that

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Speaker 1: they're not they have such a desire to serve their community,

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Speaker 1: but yet they don't receive the appropriate amount of funding.

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Speaker 1: The state might not provide the amount of training that

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Speaker 1: would bring them up to speed, say with their colleagues

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Speaker 1: that are a medical examiner's office, and they don't have

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Speaker 1: the facilities. UM. I've worked in, you know, with corners

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Speaker 1: offices before, where I've worked in some of the most

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Speaker 1: deplorable conditions that you imagine. Um. And and it's because

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Speaker 1: there were no resources existent. And I think a lot

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Speaker 1: of it comes down to many times politicians they don't

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Speaker 1: want to think about death. They don't want to sit

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Speaker 1: around and talk about death. But isn't it interesting that

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Speaker 1: it's going to impact everybody. It's going to touch everybody's life.

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Speaker 1: No one is they say, gets out alive and it

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Speaker 1: sooner or later. Uh, As it all kind of spins

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Speaker 1: around and life goes on, people are going to be

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Speaker 1: impacted by the services of the corner and in my estimation,

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Speaker 1: there is no greater service than UH than helping families

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Speaker 1: that have lost a loved one. I've worked in both

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Speaker 1: corners and medical examiners over the course of my career,

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Speaker 1: and the one commonality that I have found is that UH,

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Speaker 1: in the offices I've worked in, that people always were

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Speaker 1: striving for excellence. They wanted to be there as medical

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Speaker 1: legal death investigators. But the problem is is that many

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Speaker 1: times many of them like training and they don't necessarily

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Speaker 1: have all the resources that other people have. So you've

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Speaker 1: explained to me what a corner is. Of course, you know,

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Speaker 1: I'm going to show my age here and saying I

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Speaker 1: used to watch Quincy all the time, is my favorite

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Speaker 1: show with Jack Klugman. So what is the difference between

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Speaker 1: a medical examiner and a corner. Well, you know, I'm

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Speaker 1: glad that you mentioned the show Quincy. I get that.

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Speaker 1: I get that comment a lot. Did you know that

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Speaker 1: that corners out in And this is one of the

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Speaker 1: little interesting little factorys about corners in certain areas of California.

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Speaker 1: The corner and the sheriff. Listen to me very carefully.

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Speaker 1: The corner and the sheriff are one and the same.

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Speaker 1: In the office, and there's a lot of people that

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Speaker 1: have a problem with that that they see that as

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Speaker 1: a conflict of interest between these two offices, and yet

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Speaker 1: they will employ a medical examiner to actually do the examinations. Now,

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Speaker 1: it kind of makes your head spin when you begin

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Speaker 1: to think of it. There's actually, you know, Jackie, there's

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Speaker 1: actually a couple of states out there that where the

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Speaker 1: corner is also a prosecutor, which I find fascinating. You

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Speaker 1: can go down to Texas, they don't have corners, and

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Speaker 1: you go to the big cities. They'll have a medical

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Speaker 1: examiner in cities, But do you know who actually does

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Speaker 1: the job of the corner in Texas and many of

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Speaker 1: those counties, the justice of the peace. It's just one

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Speaker 1: of these things that's all over the board. So when

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Speaker 1: we begin to talk about medical examiners commonly and not

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Speaker 1: in every single case, I think that Michigan is probably

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Speaker 1: one of the best examples where you'll have a physician

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Speaker 1: that is not necessarily a pathologist or forensic pathologists, but

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Speaker 1: they are a physician and they kind of handle individual

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Speaker 1: counties in that in that region. But by and large,

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Speaker 1: when you think about medical examiner, you think about this

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Speaker 1: term that people here in the media all the time, UM,

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Speaker 1: forensic pathologist. And to give you an example, for instance,

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Speaker 1: if you're going to be if you have kids that

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Speaker 1: come to me all the time at university and they say,

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Speaker 1: I want to be a forensic pathologist, I want to

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Speaker 1: be a medical examiner, and I explained to them what

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Speaker 1: they have to do, and this is what you have

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Speaker 1: to do. This is the simple recipe. First off, you

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Speaker 1: gotta go to medical school. Well how long is that, Well,

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Speaker 1: that's four years after you graduate with your undergraduate degree.

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Speaker 1: And then if you want to go into forensic pathology,

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Speaker 1: first off, you have to go through a pathology residency.

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Speaker 1: That's five years shackie. So we're talking about right now

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Speaker 1: at this point, nine years after you graduated with your

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Speaker 1: undergraduate degree. And then if you make it through the

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Speaker 1: pathology residency, which is you know, all the stuff that

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Speaker 1: they do looking at tumors and then managing a lab

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Speaker 1: and all those sorts of things in hospitals, then you

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Speaker 1: have to find what's referred to as a forensic pathology residency. UM. Now,

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Speaker 1: when I was working in Atlanta, we had a it's

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Speaker 1: actually a fellowship, We had a fellowship program there. You know,

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Speaker 1: we only selected two people per year that would come

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Speaker 1: in and they were from all over the world. So

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Speaker 1: it's highly competitive to get one of these positions as

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Speaker 1: a as a forensic pathologist. And then you have to

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Speaker 1: make it through all of the training and it's very,

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Speaker 1: very intensive. So you have all of these years of

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Speaker 1: training that an individual has to go through to become

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Speaker 1: a medical examiner. Um. And then you compare that to

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Speaker 1: what many states UH use. UH. Their system is a

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Speaker 1: corner system where they don't have a medical examiner. So

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Speaker 1: you know, we talked about the level or lack thereof,

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Speaker 1: of of education, of the resources that are made available

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Speaker 1: two corners, and it's a real head scratcher, isn't it.

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Speaker 1: Because you can go to a place like say, for instance,

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Speaker 1: I'll give you a great example, UM, a state of Oklahoma.

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Speaker 1: State of Oklahoma doesn't have corners. That's a statewide medical

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Speaker 1: examiners system. Same thing in New Mexico statewide medical examiner system.

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Speaker 1: You get down to Florida, the state is broken into

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Speaker 1: districts where you have a district medical examiner for all

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Speaker 1: these various areas down and down in Florida, Virginia the

393
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Speaker 1: same way. But you go to New York and New

394
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Speaker 1: York has still has county corners in in that area,

395
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Speaker 1: but they have a state Medical Examiner. It's very confusing.

396
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Speaker 1: They have a state medical Examiner and then they have

397
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Speaker 1: UH in of course New York City they have the

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Speaker 1: Office of the Chief Medical Examiner. So you get these

399
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Speaker 1: amalgams that are thrown in on top of it, and

400
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Speaker 1: it it leaves people sitting back and no wonder they

401
00:23:31,359 --> 00:23:34,720
Speaker 1: get so confused because the media, I think, many times

402
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Speaker 1: uses these terms interchangeably. I think you're right, and I

403
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Speaker 1: also think that you just gave me a whole new

404
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Speaker 1: respect for the people that I work with day in

405
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Speaker 1: and day out. I did not realize that it was

406
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Speaker 1: that intensive to become a forensic pathologist. Now do you

407
00:23:53,000 --> 00:23:56,400
Speaker 1: have to be certified to be a medical examiner? Well,

408
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Speaker 1: that's going to be depended upon the state in order

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Speaker 1: to become um a medical examiner or there's it's not

410
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Speaker 1: necessarily termed that way as a certification, it is. There

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Speaker 1: is a board certification. So let me kind of break

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Speaker 1: it down for you. First off, you have to be

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Speaker 1: an m D. Okay, if we're going with a kind

414
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Speaker 1: of a classic model here, you have to be an

415
00:24:18,240 --> 00:24:21,840
Speaker 1: m d of a medical physician. Then you have to

416
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Speaker 1: be a pathologist, which means you have to do that

417
00:24:24,640 --> 00:24:27,040
Speaker 1: five year residency. Well, at the end of that five

418
00:24:27,119 --> 00:24:29,720
Speaker 1: year residency, these these people have to go through this

419
00:24:30,320 --> 00:24:34,399
Speaker 1: just intense, intense board certification and they get certified and

420
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Speaker 1: what's referred to as anatomical pathology and then clinical pathology.

421
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Speaker 1: And then after that there's subdivisions. You can go into

422
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Speaker 1: blood banking, you can go into historic pathology, or you

423
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Speaker 1: can go into say, for instance, forensic pathology, and that's

424
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Speaker 1: a one year fellowship. That's another three and sixty five

425
00:24:53,680 --> 00:24:55,639
Speaker 1: days of training you have to endure and then you

426
00:24:55,640 --> 00:24:58,280
Speaker 1: have to go through another test for that. And there

427
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Speaker 1: are many people that go through all of the training

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Speaker 1: and they get to the forensic pathology training and that

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Speaker 1: might sit for those boards Jackie, if you can imagine this.

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Speaker 1: I've known of people that have sat three and four

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Speaker 1: times and they never pass it because it's that intense.

432
00:25:11,560 --> 00:25:13,879
Speaker 1: So you know, when at the end of the day,

433
00:25:13,960 --> 00:25:17,960
Speaker 1: at the end of that process, you really produce a

434
00:25:18,040 --> 00:25:24,840
Speaker 1: high quality UH practitioner at the end. But here's the downside. Um,

435
00:25:24,920 --> 00:25:27,960
Speaker 1: if after you've gone through all of this training, now

436
00:25:28,000 --> 00:25:30,240
Speaker 1: if you're working as a forensic pathologist, you're gonna go

437
00:25:30,320 --> 00:25:33,200
Speaker 1: to work for the government, and you can imagine that

438
00:25:33,400 --> 00:25:35,520
Speaker 1: you're not going to get paid as well as many

439
00:25:35,560 --> 00:25:38,760
Speaker 1: of your colleagues say they just stopped with general pathology.

440
00:25:38,800 --> 00:25:41,640
Speaker 1: And you're gonna be undergoing the rigors of court. You're

441
00:25:41,640 --> 00:25:44,720
Speaker 1: gonna be doing autopsies day in and day out. Um,

442
00:25:44,880 --> 00:25:46,640
Speaker 1: you're going to have to see some of the most

443
00:25:46,640 --> 00:25:50,360
Speaker 1: horrible things that you can possibly imagine. And right now,

444
00:25:50,400 --> 00:25:54,920
Speaker 1: there is a real desperate uh lack of board certified

445
00:25:54,960 --> 00:25:57,560
Speaker 1: forensic pathologists out there. I've I've actually talked to a

446
00:25:57,560 --> 00:25:59,800
Speaker 1: couple of people that always bring it to my attention.

447
00:25:59,800 --> 00:26:04,440
Speaker 1: They say, you know, there are more board certified neuro

448
00:26:05,080 --> 00:26:08,719
Speaker 1: neurosurgeons than there are forensic pathologists in this country, And

449
00:26:08,720 --> 00:26:11,000
Speaker 1: just kind of wrap your mind around that just for

450
00:26:11,040 --> 00:26:14,000
Speaker 1: a second, because there's not a lot of people that

451
00:26:14,080 --> 00:26:16,200
Speaker 1: go into the field, but yet there's such a need.

452
00:26:16,840 --> 00:26:19,720
Speaker 1: You know, when you think about, um, you know the

453
00:26:19,760 --> 00:26:24,359
Speaker 1: big cities that require this constant uh tending to the dead,

454
00:26:24,400 --> 00:26:26,560
Speaker 1: if you will, an examination of these bodies. You go

455
00:26:26,640 --> 00:26:29,040
Speaker 1: to places like New York in l A and Detroit

456
00:26:29,080 --> 00:26:33,480
Speaker 1: and Chicago and Miami, and Atlanta. Um, you've always got

457
00:26:33,480 --> 00:26:36,040
Speaker 1: an influx of bodies that need to be examined. They

458
00:26:36,040 --> 00:26:39,439
Speaker 1: need to be examined by professionals. Well what do you

459
00:26:39,480 --> 00:26:42,520
Speaker 1: do if you're if you're in a corner state and

460
00:26:42,600 --> 00:26:45,560
Speaker 1: you don't have access to a forensic pathologist. Well, those

461
00:26:45,600 --> 00:26:49,600
Speaker 1: bodies have to be transported to a location where you

462
00:26:49,640 --> 00:26:52,720
Speaker 1: can get access to somebody that can effectively do an autopsy.

463
00:26:52,720 --> 00:26:55,400
Speaker 1: And it creates a real, real problem. So let's throw

464
00:26:55,400 --> 00:26:57,840
Speaker 1: a monkey wrench in this show. Where do you come

465
00:26:57,920 --> 00:27:02,159
Speaker 1: in in this hierarchy? The that's scene investigator. Well, you know,

466
00:27:02,520 --> 00:27:05,159
Speaker 1: people have asked me that before, and you know they

467
00:27:05,200 --> 00:27:07,560
Speaker 1: they say, well, you say you work for a corner

468
00:27:07,600 --> 00:27:09,720
Speaker 1: you work for a medical exam er. Well, yeah, I'm

469
00:27:09,760 --> 00:27:12,879
Speaker 1: I'm once referred to as a medico legal or was

470
00:27:12,880 --> 00:27:16,000
Speaker 1: was I'm a college professor now, but you know you

471
00:27:16,840 --> 00:27:20,520
Speaker 1: I worked as a medico legal death investigator. And essentially

472
00:27:20,560 --> 00:27:24,639
Speaker 1: what that means is that just like homicide detectives go

473
00:27:24,720 --> 00:27:28,679
Speaker 1: out and they are the eyes and the ears of

474
00:27:29,000 --> 00:27:31,480
Speaker 1: the chief of police, or you can even extend that

475
00:27:31,560 --> 00:27:34,800
Speaker 1: to the prosecutor because they're looking to prosecute a case

476
00:27:34,960 --> 00:27:40,040
Speaker 1: of homicide. People like myself are the eyes and the

477
00:27:40,040 --> 00:27:44,080
Speaker 1: ears of the forensic pathologists in the field. So you know,

478
00:27:44,560 --> 00:27:46,720
Speaker 1: you see it on TV where you have these doctors,

479
00:27:46,800 --> 00:27:48,760
Speaker 1: you know, these forensic pathologists that go out to these

480
00:27:48,760 --> 00:27:51,159
Speaker 1: scenes and these dramas and all that stuff. There's not

481
00:27:51,280 --> 00:27:54,480
Speaker 1: enough them to do that, Jackie. It just it doesn't happen. Now,

482
00:27:54,520 --> 00:27:57,639
Speaker 1: I've been out on scenes with forensic pathologists before. Trust me,

483
00:27:57,960 --> 00:28:00,800
Speaker 1: it does happen every now and then. But for the

484
00:28:00,840 --> 00:28:03,840
Speaker 1: most part, day in and day out, it's gonna be

485
00:28:03,960 --> 00:28:07,600
Speaker 1: people like myself that go out and they go and

486
00:28:07,640 --> 00:28:10,040
Speaker 1: observe the bodies at the scene. Remember, one of the

487
00:28:10,040 --> 00:28:14,399
Speaker 1: most important parts of death investigation is seeing the body

488
00:28:14,800 --> 00:28:19,159
Speaker 1: in its natural, pristine state, that place where you you live,

489
00:28:19,280 --> 00:28:22,720
Speaker 1: you and dwell, where you go about your business with

490
00:28:22,840 --> 00:28:26,360
Speaker 1: your family, where things happen to you in that environment.

491
00:28:26,400 --> 00:28:29,119
Speaker 1: When you take that body out of context and you

492
00:28:29,119 --> 00:28:30,960
Speaker 1: don't go out to the scene to examine the body,

493
00:28:30,960 --> 00:28:35,600
Speaker 1: it can wind up creating major problems. So for the

494
00:28:35,680 --> 00:28:39,000
Speaker 1: medical legal people like myself, the investigators, we go out

495
00:28:39,440 --> 00:28:41,680
Speaker 1: take photos at the scene just like the police do.

496
00:28:41,880 --> 00:28:46,400
Speaker 1: We do our measurements, we do our examinations um and

497
00:28:46,440 --> 00:28:48,880
Speaker 1: then we make a decision at the scene as to

498
00:28:48,920 --> 00:28:50,720
Speaker 1: whether or not we're going to release the body from

499
00:28:50,720 --> 00:28:52,920
Speaker 1: the scene to a funeral home or if we're gonna

500
00:28:52,960 --> 00:28:55,920
Speaker 1: bring the body in for further examination back at the

501
00:28:55,960 --> 00:29:00,360
Speaker 1: county Mork And that's that's the longest sort of it.

502
00:29:00,480 --> 00:29:04,080
Speaker 1: That's what we do. The difference between a medical legal

503
00:29:04,120 --> 00:29:06,840
Speaker 1: death investigator and say, for instance, a homicide investigator is

504
00:29:06,880 --> 00:29:12,160
Speaker 1: that homicide investigators specifically focused on homicide. Well, homicides make

505
00:29:12,200 --> 00:29:14,880
Speaker 1: up a very very small percentage of the satality of

506
00:29:14,920 --> 00:29:17,720
Speaker 1: all the deaths that occur. We still have to go

507
00:29:17,760 --> 00:29:21,200
Speaker 1: out and examine um examine natural deaths and of course

508
00:29:21,200 --> 00:29:24,360
Speaker 1: suicides and accidents and all these things. But are working premise,

509
00:29:24,440 --> 00:29:26,960
Speaker 1: and this is something that that I teach my students

510
00:29:27,000 --> 00:29:29,720
Speaker 1: and always have and always will is that our working

511
00:29:29,720 --> 00:29:34,560
Speaker 1: assumption is that every death, every death is a homicide

512
00:29:34,960 --> 00:29:37,680
Speaker 1: until we can prove otherwise. And the reason we do

513
00:29:37,760 --> 00:29:42,160
Speaker 1: that is because if you assume that everything that you

514
00:29:42,200 --> 00:29:45,480
Speaker 1: go out on is a homicide, that's the most intense

515
00:29:45,680 --> 00:29:49,440
Speaker 1: investigation that you can conduct, and that way that ensures

516
00:29:49,440 --> 00:29:52,120
Speaker 1: that you're not gonna miss anything, that you're going to

517
00:29:52,200 --> 00:29:56,080
Speaker 1: assume that something nefarious has happened to this individual, and

518
00:29:56,120 --> 00:29:58,520
Speaker 1: then logically you begin to go down your checklist and

519
00:29:58,520 --> 00:30:02,040
Speaker 1: you're whittling things away until you come to a conclusion

520
00:30:02,120 --> 00:30:05,120
Speaker 1: that it's something other than homicide, for instance, and then

521
00:30:05,160 --> 00:30:07,640
Speaker 1: you can move forward with the investigation. You can get

522
00:30:07,680 --> 00:30:10,320
Speaker 1: medical records or or you can go back and get

523
00:30:10,320 --> 00:30:13,240
Speaker 1: psychiatric records, for instance, if you're dealing with a suicide

524
00:30:13,840 --> 00:30:18,360
Speaker 1: um and it all fits into one gigantic piece, which

525
00:30:18,400 --> 00:30:22,440
Speaker 1: should be a complete investigation relative to manner and cause

526
00:30:22,480 --> 00:30:30,640
Speaker 1: of death. I'm Joseph S. Gott Morgan, and this is

527
00:30:30,720 --> 00:30:31,400
Speaker 1: body Backs