By Sharyn L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter
CHEHALIS – The coroners inquest into the controversial 1998 death in Toledo of former state trooper Ronda Reynolds is back on, tentatively scheduled for mid-October.
Lewis County Coroner Warren McLeod announced this morning an appeal in the case has been put on hold.
Lewis County Coroner Warren McLeod
The state Court of Appeals issued a “stay” on June 20, after hearing from lawyers for the coroner and Barb Thompson, mother of the deceased, according to McLeod.
Their reason, according to McLeod, is to see what the outcome of a coroner’s inquest would be.
McLeod said in a news release the inquest will be held in Lewis County, he will be the presiding officer.
One of McLeod’s first acts after he took office in January was to change Reynolds’ death certificate from suicide to undetermined. Soon afterward, he announced he would hold a coroners inquest; to be conducted in Clark County.
In May, however, he put the inquest on hold, saying he needed to wait for the outcome of the civil case appeal – Thompson vs. Wilson.
A panel of three judges heard from attorneys on both sides on June 16.
Reynolds, 33, was found with a bullet in her head and covered by a turned-on electric blanket on the floor of a closet in the home she shared with her husband of less than a year, Ron Reynolds, in December 1998.
The case was the subject of a judicial review in Lewis County in November 2009 after which a panel of citizens concluded then-Coroner Terry Wilson’s determination that Reynolds’ died of suicide was arbitrary, capricious and incorrect. A judge ordered Wilson to change the manner of death, but Wilson appealed.
The appeal is now on hold, as the judge’s want to see what the outcome of an inquest will be.
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See the rules governing the procedures for the coroner’s inquest, here
Linda is quite correct. As a coroner I am not qualified to perform autopsies. Only doctors who are certified forensic pathologists can do autopsies.
I am going to hold an inquest where all of the evidence in the case is heard in a public forum. The autopsy was done on Ronda after her death 13 years ago.
The witnesses will include the pathologist who performed the autopsy and a pathologist who reviewed that autopsy to list but a few.
I hope this clears up any misunderstanding.
I want you to watch the Frontline episode on how forensic medicine is failing. Then you can comment.
So I guess because he Teaches people how to become a forensic pathologist, he’s not qualified to do an autopsy?
Your bias is showing.
i am going to voice my concerns that our coroner is NOT a forensic pathologist, with a M.D. He is NOT qualified to conduct another autopsy.