TITLE 19

CRIMINAL PROCEDURE

CHAPTER 43

CORONER’S INQUESTS

19-4301.  County coroner to investigate deaths. (1) When a county coroner is informed that a person has died, the county coroner shall investigate that death if:

(a)  The death is a suspected homicide, suicide, or occurring under suspicious or unknown circumstances;

(b)  The death appears to be accidental or following an injury;

(c)  The death was a result of suspected unlawful use of controlled substances or the use or abuse of chemicals or toxic agents;

(d)  The death occurred while the person was incarcerated in any jail or correctional facility or the person was a ward of the state;

(e)  The death appears to be by disease, injury, or toxic agent during or arising from employment;

(f)  The death was an unattended death that occurred outside of a physician’s current care or hospice care;

(g)  The remains of the deceased are scientifically or visually unidentifiable due to the remains being skeletal or charred;

(h)  The person was admitted to a hospital emergency room unconscious and unresponsive, with or without cardiopulmonary resuscitative measures being performed, and died within twenty-four (24) hours of admission without regaining consciousness or responsiveness, unless a physician was in attendance within thirty-six (36) hours preceding presentation to the hospital, or, in cases in which the decedent had a pre-diagnosed terminal or bedfast condition, a physician was in attendance within thirty (30) days preceding presentation to the hospital;

(i)  The death may constitute a threat to public health; or

(j)  The death is of a child if there is a reasonable articulable suspicion to believe that the death occurred without a known medical disease to account for the child’s death.

(2)  If a death occurs that is not attended by a physician and the cause of death cannot be certified by a physician, the coroner shall perform a medicolegal death investigation working with the sheriff of the county or the chief of police of the city in which the incident causing the death occurred or, if such county or city is unknown, to the sheriff or chief of police of the county or city where the body was found. The criminal investigation shall be the responsibility of the appropriate law enforcement agency. The medicolegal death investigation shall be the responsibility of the coroner. Upon completion of the criminal investigation, a written report shall be provided to the coroner of the county in which the death occurred or, if such county is unknown, to the coroner of the county where the body was found, and the coroner’s medicolegal death investigation report shall be given to the law enforcement agency responsible.

(3)  A coroner in the county where the incident causing the death occurred or, if such county is unknown, the coroner in the county where the body was found, may conduct an inquest if there are reasonable grounds to believe as a result of the investigation that the death occurred as provided in subsection (1) of this section.

(4)  If an inquest is to be conducted, the coroner shall summon six (6) persons qualified by law to serve as jurors for the inquest.

(5)  Nothing in this section shall be construed to affect the tenets of any church or religious belief.

History:

[19-4301, added 2005, ch. 80, sec. 2, p. 291; am. 2025, ch. 96, sec. 1, p. 511.]