Will board separate coroner from sheriff’s office?

At the Dec. 5 Riverside County Board of Supervisors meeting, an item on the agenda asks for the county’s chief executive to examine the ramifications of separating the coroner’s office from the sheriff’s department.

The recommendation came from Chair Kevin Jeffries (1st District) and Supervisor V. Manuel Perez (4th District), who joined with Jeffries on the proposal at his request.

Since 1999, the Riverside County Coroner’s Office has been part of the sheriff’s office. California is just one of three states that permits counties to combine these two offices. In California, only 10 counties have separated the two offices.

The coroner investigates and reports on all violent, sudden or unusual deaths of persons within the county as established by California law.

For several years statewide, not just in Riverside County, there have been concerns raised about a county’s coroner, who reports to the sheriff, reviewing a homicide in which an officer is involved. Some people voice the argument that there is an inherent conflict if the coroner answers to the sheriff, especially when the review involves another sheriff’s employee.

“This is one of those issues that is talked about on and off for years,” Jeff Greene, Jeffries’ chief of staff said. “It is not about Sheriff [Chad] Bianco. It’s that California is an outlier.”

In recent years, at least two separate incidents occurred where this issue was significant. Most recently, in December 2020, Angelo Quinto died while in police custody. The Contra Costa County Coroner, which is part of that county’s sheriff’s office, “ruled Angelo’s death was the result of ‘excited delirium.’” Several independent sources, such as the School of Medicine at the University of Oregon, counter that excited delirium “rarely occurs outside of police involvement,” according to the state Assembly’s April 2022 report on Assembly Bill 1608.

In 2022, this bill passed the Assembly but stalled in the Senate. AB 1608 would have required the counties with a combined sheriff’s and coroner’s office to separate them.

“This bill would ensure that death investigations are conducted objectively, reducing any perception that the investigative process could be influenced by other segments of the criminal justice system,” said Assemblyman Mike Gipson, who introduced AB 1608, in a news release.

“AB 1608 will serve as a building block to create complete transparency in determining the cause of death of an individual. Specifically, this bill would separate the duties of the coroner from the duties of the sheriff, strengthening the need for a more transparent and just medical examination process,” Gipson added.

According to the Riverside County’s Coroner’s website, the coroner’s office was established on May 2, 1893. On Jan. 4, 1999, the coroner’s office consolidated with the Riverside County Sheriff’s Department, becoming the 42nd county in the state to consolidate the coroner’s office with the sheriff’s office.

“While there is no evidence of any improprieties in Riverside County regarding the operations of the Coroner’s Office under the Sheriff, the optics of a potential conflict of interest can lead to a loss of confidence in our institutions,” wrote Jeffries and Perez in their request to their colleagues.

But the question is not new to the county, the 2017-2018 Riverside County Grand Jury also looked at this issue, and recommended that as an alternative to separation, the sheriff reestablish “an agreement with acceptable terms, with an adjacent County, to perform autopsies of in-custody deaths.”

From 1999 to 2005, Riverside County had an agreement with Orange County to do this, but after its expiration in 2005, it was not renewed.

The grand jury’s recommendation noted, “In-custody deaths include those who die at the hands of law enforcement, in the presence of law enforcement, or those with recent contact with law enforcement. The integrity of the process should assure County citizens that Coroner’s reviews are fair, unbiased, fostering a reputation of trust above reproach, and diminishing the perception of a conflict of interest.”

In response to the grand jury recommendation, the sheriff’s department replied, “RCSD agrees with the Grand Jury that there is a potential for a “perception of a conflict of interest by the public” with regard to its holding of a Coroner Review in certain instances … RCSD acknowledges that the possibility exists that perceptions of a conflict of interest on a particular matter could develop in the future.”

This spring, University of Southern California researchers released a study that concluded, “… in counties where sheriffs assume the role of coroner, officer-involved homicides are underreported more often than in those where the functions are separate.”

Despite some questions raised about recent in-custody deaths involving sheriff’s staff, Jeffries and Perez stressed in their recommendation there has been no evidence of any improprieties in Riverside County regarding the operations of the coroner’s office under the sheriff.

Nevertheless, because of the past views and actions statewide, the county should be prepared to know what the “potential costs, savings, legal issues, organizational structure, and labor considerations” might be, they reasoned.

“While it has been since the 1990s that the two departments merged under the Sheriff, it doesn’t hurt to revisit and look at the idea and gather analysis on the advantages, disadvantages, costs and other considerations,” wrote Darin Schemmer, Perez’s communications director.

“And there is no question that having them together creates the potential and appearance of a conflict of interest,” said Greene. “But we have no evidence of any conflict here. Whether we need it or not, at least we should understand the implications.”

If their recommendation for a study is approved, the supervisors are asking the executive officer to bring the final report back to the board within 90 days.

The sheriff’s office has not responded to questions.