Lawmaker: Medical Examiner's Office Says Autopsy Backlog Cleared

By Hannah Gaskill, Maryland Matters | March 11, 2022

The backlog of bodies waiting for autopsy at the Maryland Office of the Chief Medical Examiner has reportedly been cleared.

In a text exchange Friday afternoon, Del. Kirill Reznik (D-Montgomery) wrote that the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner “claimed” that the autopsy overflow had been cleared when contacted by his office.

Inquiries made to the Department of Health, the Governor’s office and the Maryland Institute for Emergency Medical Services Systems and Maryland’s regional Federal Emergency Management Agency were not immediately returned.

Reznik’s office has been closely following problems within the Department of Health, which oversees the agency.

The Office of the Chief Medical Examiner has faced scrutiny since earlier this year, when delays in completing autopsies began to come to light. Officials have pointed to COVID-19, the state’s rising homicide rate, the overdose epidemic and staffing shortages within the office as the source of the backlog.

The autopsy overflow caused such significant problems that the state leased a portion of the Metro West parking garage in Baltimore to use as a makeshift morgue.

Former Chief Medical Examiner Dr. Victor Weedn made a request in early February to the Federal Emergency Management Agency for assistance from its Disaster Mortuary Operational Response Teams for support. He projected that the backlog would surpass 300 bodies by mid-February.

Disaster Mortuary Operational Response Teams are typically deployed after natural disasters, terrorist attacks and transportation accidents.

Soon after, Dr. Jinlene Chan, Maryland’s deputy secretary of public health services, said the federal government was sending two forensic pathologists and one expert to help. It is unclear if any additional experts or assistants were deployed after Chan’s confirmation.

On Friday, the Senate Budget & Taxation Committee approved budget language that will require the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner to submit a report detailing a timeline and description of all assistance received from the Federal Emergency Management Agency, including the number of autopsies performed by FEMA personnel.

On. Feb. 18, Weedn resigned during an early morning meeting of the Postmortem Examiners Commission. Dr. Pamela E. Southall, a deputy medical examiner under Weedn, was appointed interim chief medical examiner in his stead.

This story will be updated.

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