Murder at a rest stop

If it's clearly a homicide or suspicious death, of course the coroner and CSIs would investigate.

There have been a lot of well-publicized murders that happened in and around rest stops. For example:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexandra_Zapp

http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/news/nation/2010-10-05-1Ahighwaykiller05_CV_N.htm

I think that, in the case of suspected murder, a medical examiner or coroner must attend the crime scene to pronounce.

The National Institute of Justice has a Guide to Death Scene Investigation that might be helpful for you.

ETA: The office at which the body ends up is then dependent on jurisdiction. From there, depending on facilities, the autopsy etc. is performed and you hope you have somebody who is an actual medical professional. This is something of a problem in our country, and PBS did a documentary on it called Post Mortem that is illuminating in both a very good and very bad way (and is perhaps more information than you want to get into, and might not matter with regards to your particular coroner).

Make sure you know and understand the difference between a coroner, often an elected position, and a medical examiner.

Often there aren't any specific medical requirements for the job of coroner and this can impact the resulting death investigations.

Figure out if your jurisdiction in your story would have a coroner, ME, or both, and then figure out how the competence, or lack thereof, would work for your story.

I'm a coroner in Washington State and we always send a coroner to any death that's not attended by a physician. So, unless there's something hinky going on, I don't go to nursing homes or hospitals. For what you've described, you would have a coroner on scene.

lisag1129 said:

I am hoping someone can answer this.

My killer has murdered a trucker at a rest stop in Idaho. I have I.S.P. investigating but I was wondering if a coroner goes to a homicide at a rest stop or the body is just delivered to the coroner. Also, would the coroner in the nearest town be the lucky recipient of the corpse?

I was hoping someone here might know. If I have to I will call I.S.P. but sometimes you wonder if they really believe that you are writing a book. With all the research I have done I am waiting for someone to show up at my door to confiscate my computer. LOL

Thanks for any help!

Lisa

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Whatever municipality the rest stop is in has jurisdiction over the scene. I'm not sure I understand as this sort of reads as if you're suggesting rest stops are somehow no-man's lands between borders, or something.

However the municipality deals with a crime scene and body will deal with it. Here, yes, the coroner's office will respond.

cornflake said:

Whatever municipality the rest stop is in has jurisdiction over the scene. I'm not sure I understand as this sort of reads as if you're suggesting rest stops are somehow no-man's lands between borders, or something.

However the municipality deals with a crime scene and body will deal with it. Here, yes, the coroner's office will respond.

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As an aside, even in a "no man's land between borders" you will have both sides claiming jurisdiction. I haven't seen it yet but that is the premise behind a new TV show, The Bridge, where a body is discovered on a bridge over the Rio Grande and both American and Mexican police are investigating.

I used to be a trucker and there was a trucker murdered. He was three trucks down and there was a coroner on the scene.

CWatts said:

As an aside, even in a "no man's land between borders" you will have both sides claiming jurisdiction. I haven't seen it yet but that is the premise behind a new TV show, The Bridge, where a body is discovered on a bridge over the Rio Grande and both American and Mexican police are investigating.

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Is that a remake of the Swedish-Danish one? Cos the original is brilliant.

C.M. Daniels said:

I'm a coroner in Washington State and we always send a coroner to any death that's not attended by a physician.

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Same here in Florida. Plus a law enforcement officer has to stay with the body until the coroner/ME pronounces. Having a fair number of older folks who die alone in bed, it can take hours for the ME to show up.

Jeff

Idaho operates with a county system. For each county, there is a medical examiner and a coroner position (which may be the same person). The medical examiner may work for the coroner.

For any suspicious death, both positions will go to the scene. In situ investigation of a dead body will help determine cause of death. For instance, if post mortem lividity is in the body's stomach, and the body is on the back, you know someone moved the body. Which makes it unlikely to be an accidental death.

During transport, for various reasons, the body's position might be adjusted and/or other damage done. It's important to the medical examiner to know what was done during transport as opposed to before the body being found.

The body is transported to the county morgue, which most likely is located at the main medical facility in the county. Smaller and more rural counties may use a medical facility in another county.

An autopsy should only be done by a medical examiner, who is a licensed MD with a specialty in pathology, and may have further qualifications in forensic medicine. The coroner who is not an MD may be present for the autopsy, but is not qualified to render a professional opinion as to cause of death.

Exactly how the coroners and medical examiners divide the duties between them I don't know. It may be that the coroner can overrule the cause of death over the medical examiner. Smaller and more rural counties may use medical examiners in other counties because of expertise issues. Autopsies can vary from very simple (shotgun through the heart and any medical student can give a cause of death) to extremely complex (person shot with a .22, after being beaten, and hit by a car, and then being thrown in a lake -- cause of death could be any one of the four and yes, there was a body with all of these conditions).

Boundaries between country are the same as all property lines. It's a line and the only time there is a dispute is when the body falls onto both sides of the line. Even then, the procedure for legally deciding who has jurisdiction is rather simple to accomplish. It's the politicians who want a murder (or don't want a murder) that try to muck this up. But this is a legal point the prosecutor has to prove in presenting his case to a jury. If the prosecutor has no jurisdiction, then the case must be dismissed.

Best of luck,

Jim Clark-Dawe

lisag1129 said:

Thank you all so much! There is no doubt it was homicide because my killer leaves a knife at the scene.

I really appreciate your help. Great info! I have talked to the head of the C.S.U. in Boise several times with this book but I am not sure if I have gotten on his nerves yet. So thank you!

Lisa

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Just a note that that a knife on the scene doesn't mean instant assumption of homicide - people use those to off themselves as well.

cornflake said:

Originally Posted by lisag1129
Thank you all so much! There is no doubt it was homicide because my killer leaves a knife at the scene.

I really appreciate your help. Great info! I have talked to the head of the C.S.U. in Boise several times with this book but I am not sure if I have gotten on his nerves yet. So thank you!

Lisa

Click to expand...

Just a note that that a knife on the scene doesn't mean instant assumption of homicide - people use those to off themselves as well.

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Or had been fishing and gutted a fish just before a heart attack.

A knife at the scene merely means that there is a knife at the scene, until proven by testing to be involved. If there is a knife at the scene, not in his body, and the injuries that may have caused the victim to bleed to death are consistent with being done by a knife, you have a suspicious death.

Until you get reports from the lab and the medical examiner that:

• The victim died from injuries consistent with a knife;
• Blood found on the knife is consistent with the victim's blood (verification beyond consistent with the victim's blood like DNA takes a while); and
• The injuries were not self-inflicted.

At that point, you can raise this to a murder investigation. This will take about 24 hours.

Now the police can make an assumption this is a homicide, and the investigation will be the same, but they can't officially label it a homicide until they have some evidence of the fact.

Best of luck,

Jim Clark-Dawe

If the knife is found in the body, you have three possibilities: accidental, suicide, and homicide. Depending upon the position of the knife in the body, a medical examiner can frequently call this at the scene. For instance, multiple wounds rule out accidental and probably rule out suicide. A single knife wound in the stomach or chest can be either suicide or homicide, and may be accidental. Slicing the femoral could be suicide or accidental, but isn't likely to be homicide.

Understand that victim's hand grasping the knife indicates nothing. Most people, if they get stabbed and the knife is still in them, will grab the handle.

If the ME can call it at the scene, he or she will, with the proviso that subsequent investigation might change that opinion.

Best of luck,

Jim Clark-Dawe