Grand Jury Rebukes Medical Examiner's Office

A grand jury report released Monday says&nbsp;state medical examiner&#39;s administrators "willful blindness or gross incompetence" led to&nbsp;emotional and sexual harassment of employees and mismanagement of evidence. <BR><BR><A href="http://www.oag.ok.gov/oagweb.nsf/0/4f08268923589981862575f9006f2a9f/$FILE/me%20interim%20report.pdf" target=_blank>Read the Grand Jury&#39;s Report</A> | <A href="/Global/story.asp?S=10628749">Oklahoma ME&#39;s Office Loses Accreditation</A>

Monday, July 20th 2009, 4:37 pm

By: News 9


News9.com

OKLAHOMA CITY - A grand jury report released Monday says employees of the state medical examiner's office have been psychologically, emotionally and sexually victimized.

The state's medical examiner's office had been under the microscope for months. Concerns over mismanagement and allegations of sexual harassment sparked the Multicounty Grand Jury investigation.

The report said employees have been "victimized psychologically, emotionally and sexually." It accuses the previous chief medical examiners of "turning a blind eye" to the problems.

"The grand jurors heard testimony of the sexual battery and harassment of agency employees," Attorney General Drew Edmondson said. "With no one in management to turn to for assistance, these employees must have felt completely helpless and trapped in an impossible situation."

Former Chief Medical Examiner Kevin Rowland's attorney said that's not true and it's all part of a retaliation plan.

"You've got to have a crisis before anything gets done in this state," former Chief Medical Examiner Kevin Rowland said.

In 2007, Kevin Rowland warned the medical examiner's office was facing a crisis.

"The bodies are going to stack up," Rowland said.

Rowland's attorney said those kind of public comments regarding the state of the medical examiner's office are why others are going after his client.

"What has happened here is we've let a political process overtake the grand jury system," said Rowland's attorney Scott Adams.

Read the Grand Jury's Full Report (PDF)

The nine-page report released by a multicounty grand jury said the chief investigator's behavior was abrasive, sexually harassing and sometimes rose to violations of criminal law.

Testimony also indicates that sexual harassment and sexual battery were carried out within the office.

The spokeswoman for the Chief Medical Examiner's Office said that kind of behavior is no longer tolerated.

"If it happened before, we really regret that. We really do, but we don't tolerate that now," said M.E. spokeswoman Cherokee Ballard.

Ballard said the report is no surprise to those still at the office and the new chief medical examiner is already taking action to fix the problems and establish rules and guidelines that did not exist before.

One of the recommendations in the report is for the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation to take over the operations at the Medical Examiner's office. That's something the new Chief Medical Examiner strongly opposes. He said it's going to take more money, manpower and space to get the office back on the right track and to eventually regain its accreditation.

The medical examiner's office recently lost its accreditation from the National Association of Medical Examiners.

The report also accuses the M.E.'s office of mishandling items that could have been used as evidence in criminal cases.

"Problems with not containing cross contamination of evidence of things like that, things that were of evidential value that weren't treated as so, things that could cause problems for prosecutors down the road when they're prosecuting cases," said Oklahoma Attorney General spokesperson Charlie Price.

Witnesses told the grand jury employees took drug paraphernalia from the deceased and were allowed to prominently display their collections on their desks.

NEWS 9 legal analyst Irven Box said this can be useful information for defense attorneys.

"It may make a difference in some future cases and some in the past that are on appeal," Box said.

The Multicounty Grand Jury also issued two sealed indictments. One indictment, to be unsealed in Oklahoma County District Court, names one person on one count. The second, to be unsealed in Tulsa County District Court, names one person on four counts.

Dates for unsealing the indictments have not been set. It is unclear if the indictments were related to the medical examiner's office.

Continuing Coverage:

- Oklahoma ME's Office Loses Accreditation
- OSBI Investigates Medical Examiner's Office

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