The next time there's an incident like Jim Chasse's death, we should pay the Oregon medical examiner $37.50 and have the body looked at by medical students. We'd have a better chance of getting the truth.

ME and closeness of cops isn't unique to Portland. Remember the crooked ME in Texas that lied on most cases to juries? and than there was the crooked forensic guy with the FBI.
To fund an independent ME would be easy take a cut from over-priced funeral parlors.
This almost ranks with my unholy Trinity: Police, District Attorney, and Judges. Judges are included as most come out of DA's. This should be discouraged and judges should come from Private attorney offices.As it is now impartially is about on even keel with flying pigs.

We still have state police? News to me. Where do they hang out?

nice way to get a Sunday off to a window smashing RAGE...is anyone going to be held accou..........oh, yeah, I forgot, sorry.

ME's Office -- Another perspective

I think there are different experiences with the Multnomah County ME's office, maybe depending upon which deputy ME is involved.

I've had the week from hell, and one of the few bright spots in this week was one of the deputy MEs, Peter Bellant.

My youngest child, Alex, died of a heroin overdose a week ago tonight. He was 30. His drug problems were uncontrolled for more than 12 years, and it had been 5 years since I had seen him. His choice, not mine. I had stopped "helping" him with money or other bail outs and I became another one of "The Enemy" in his mind.

Still, although Alex was living -- and dieing -- in a shit hole place over in Montevilla, Bellant separately found both Alex' mother and me. I know that with me, Bellant was gentle, and kind, and honest about the patheic way my son died. In what has been the worst week in my life, one of the only good things that happened was the gentle kindness and honesty of the deputy ME. It would have been so easy for Ballant to handle this as just another dead useless junkie. Instead, Mult. Co. DME Ballant treated Alex with respect, and me as well. And I will always be grateful for that kindness.

There are so many bad things about this week that I still can't understand. One "good" thing that I can't understand is how anyone could do a deputy ME's job day after day. It must be emotionally and psychologically corrosive.

There is more than one perspective about the Mult. Co. ME's office.

Thank you for providing a balance. Condolences to you. It's been a tough week in the life-and-death department.

KISS,

I couldn't agree more with your post. We have too much of the "unholy trinity" going on in P-town, and much of it involves railroading the innocent citizen into plea bargains, and covering up the publicly-employed guilty.

I'm not sure that will ever change, absent pitchforks and torches...

pitchforks, torches and/or astute investigative reporting.

Also, I would say the trinity covers up substantial private unjust gain. Imho, there is a pressing need to address this one way or another; just recently I met another person whose life and career have been ruined because of this b.s.