Why Pierce County is changing the way it reports deaths to the public
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- Pierce County is launching a portal Dec. 1 with real-time information on decedent cases.
- The new system of reporting death information is intended to improve transparency.
- It will replace the Medical Examiner’s practice of posting news releases about deaths.
The Pierce County Medical Examiner’s Office next week will change the way it publicly reports deaths under its jurisdiction.
The office, which focuses on investigating unnatural deaths, plans to launch an online portal Dec. 1 that will provide real-time information about decedents, according to county officials, replacing its current practice of publishing news releases on its website and through email for each decedent.
News releases are typically updated as key details get confirmed, such as a person’s identity or the cause and manner of their death.
In the portal, which will be accessible at medis-public.piercecountywa.gov, visitors will see a chronological listing of decedent cases. Each case can be expanded to view the statuses of important details, according to a recent preview given to The News Tribune. Those details include cause and manner of death; progress of a postmortem examination report; whether remains have been released to a funeral home; and the law enforcement agency working the case, if applicable, among other information.
The portal will be automatically updated during each phase of the investigative process in an effort to improve transparency and accessibility for interested parties, the county said in a statement. It will also reduce the workload of staff who respond to public inquiries or publish news releases to the office’s website, according to Luke Vogelsberg, the Medical Examiner Office’s director of operations.
Before providing a demonstration of the new tool Friday, Vogelsberg said it was inspired by the efforts of other offices to be more transparent, including the King County Medical Examiner’s Office, which publishes a daily list of decedents whose identities have been confirmed.
“We are working for the public. There’s a public interest in a lot of stuff we do,” he said. “I wanted to take it a step further, though.”
The Pierce County Medical Examiner’s Office’s portal was modeled heavily after the system employed by the County of Los Angeles Medical Examiner, according to Vogelsberg. Pierce County’s portal was built in-house this year by county IT employees who also erected the office’s case management system.
County spokesperson Connor Davis said Tuesday that the portal won’t increase costs to the county’s budget, which already accounts for ongoing maintenance of web infrastructure.
Vogelsberg noted that the new tool will be automated, in contrast to the current manual approach, communicating directly with the case-management system that the office uses to perform data entry. The portal will be updated roughly 30 to 60 seconds after changes are recorded in the case management system, he said.
Instead of needing to call the medical examiner’s office for updates, families will be able to see when autopsy reports are completed and funeral homes will have visibility into when a body is ready to be released to them, he said.
There was currently no plan for an alert or subscription option to notify users when case information has been updated, according to Vogelsberg. As such, users will need to proactively check the portal.
“With all cases under our jurisdiction appearing in the portal, the alerts would be numerous,” he said in an email Friday. “Notably, our current News Flash page will still exist, but will no longer be used for case-specific information, just for general announcements and press releases.”
Search functions on the portal’s landing page will allow users to also find cases by a decedent’s name, case number, age, manner of death or date of death. Unlike the current practice, the location of a death won’t be shown to the addresses’ block number — due to a technological limitation, Vogelsberg said — and instead will display a municipality, zip code, and location type such as home, business or public roadway.
Initial information will be posted once a decedent’s family has been notified or 48 hours after a decedent has been identified, according to the county. The portal will only display deaths reported on or after its launch. Details about deaths reported prior to Dec. 1 will remain available on the Medical Examiner’s Office’s website.
