Coroner

The coroner is an elected city or county official and is answerable to the courts. The holder of this office is called upon to undertake medicolegal death investigation, instances involving questionable deaths—those by homicide, suicide, and accident as well as death by natural causes when the decedent had no contact with a physician for a length of time established by a particular jurisdiction. Qualifications for holding the office of coroner vary from one jurisdiction to another, as does the length of time established by local law in which a pertinent death must be reported. The title and duties of coroner have a long history; over time, specific responsibilities have evolved to cover a considerable range of activities.

The information provided by coroner's offices is crucial to both the judicial system and to the recording of public health information. The records and documentation provide vital information about mortality in the United States, information that is used for determining aspects of public health policy as well as serving the need of government, university, and private foundation researchers. In this entry, the history of the title and the duties of coroner are discussed as is the critical role that contemporary media and television crime dramas have had in increasing public interest in this important position.

Origin and History

The word coroner originally meant “an officer of the Crown,” and the concept dates from medieval times. The edict that formally established the coroner position was Article 20 of the Articles of Eyre September 1194, which stated “In every county of King's realm shall be elected three knights and one clerk, to keep the pleas of the crown.” The original Latin is custos placitorum coronas, from which the word coroner is derived. At the time Hubert Walter, the Chief Justiciar and Archbishop of Canterbury, was temporarily in charge of King Richard the Lion Heart's English kingdom during the king's absence. Archbishop Walter conceived the idea of a death duty, and he created the position of coroner, a person charged with the task of looking into deaths, to make sure that the death duties were paid to the king. When the basic framework of English law came with settlers to the New World, the office and duties of coroner made the crossing as well.

When the English settlers arrived in North America during the 1600s, they brought the coroner system with them. During the next 200 years the coroner became an integral part of death investigation. As the system evolved, change also occurred, especially where the need for enhanced medical knowledge existed. This awareness developed first in England where it was recognized there was a need for medical knowledge to be included in the death investigation. In the mid- to late 1800s, Massachusetts and Maryland passed coroner's acts, which required a physician be present at all death investigations to record any pertinent medical information related to the death.

Death investigation today requires that evidence be collected, coroners conduct an inquest, and valuables and property be collected and safeguarded for return to the rightful owner as opposed to being confiscated as taxes for the Crown.

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