April 23, 2025 • 43 mins
Guest Bio and Links:
Karla Knight Deese is the elected coroner of Lancaster County, SC, and founder of the first-ever Mounted Response Unit within a coroner’s office. A certified medicolegal death investigator and educator, she’s changed laws, pioneered team-based approaches, and turned rescue horses into federally protected deputies. Karla has proved how “what’s old is new again”.
Connect with Karla Knight Deese on LinkedIn @Karla Deese, D-ABMDI
Resources:
In this episode of Zone 7, Crime Scene Investigator, Sheryl McCollum, is joined by Karla Knight Deese, the coroner of Lancaster County, South Carolina, who made history by creating the first-ever Mounted Response Unit in a coroner’s office. Karla explains how a difficult river search led to the idea, how rescue horses were trained and sworn in as deputies, and how they now help find both missing people and the deceased. She also talks about how her work helps shape public health policy and how she handles one of the toughest parts of the job: delivering death notifications. Karla has proved how “what’s old is new again”, and why horses, dogs, medics, and compassion all belong on the front lines of forensic work.
Show Notes:
- (0:00) Welcome back to Zone 7 with Crime Scene Investigator, Sheryl McCollum
- (0:10) Sheryl welcomes guest, and Chief Coroner, Karla Knight Deese
- (3:00) The tragedy that sparked the movement
- (5:00) Why horses can go where humans can’t
- (11:00) ”Our team is built of horses who are rescued. Now they're being trained to use in rescue missions, so their work is definitely not done, and their worth is now highlighted exponentially through our group.”
- (13:30) Why federal protection for horses matters
- (16:00) Karla’s path to becoming a Coroner
- (23:00) Impactful cases that change law and public health
- (27:00) Using death data to save lives
- (30:00) The emotional toll of death notifications
- (41:30) “ There are a few who envy me. They wanna know what they have to do to get my job to be who I am. It's only death. How hard can it be? They say, here I silently reply. Take it all. Every festering remnant of the people no one cared about in life, much less death. All the broken children who will never know that I grieved for them, take it all. Just leave me my car key so I can get home permanently. Somebody else can listen to the bullshit. Death loves dispute. He never shuts up.” -Joseph Scott Morgan
- Thanks for listening to another episode! If you’re loving the show and want to help grow the show, please head over to Itunes and leave a rating and review!
---
Sheryl “Mac” McCollum is an Emmy Award winning CSI, a writer for CrimeOnLine, Forensic and Crime Scene Expert for Crime Stories with Nancy Grace, and a CSI for a metro Atlanta Police Department. She is the co-author of the textbook., Cold Case: Pathways to Justice. Sheryl is also the founder and director of the Cold Case Investigative Research Institute, a collaboration between universities and colleges that brings researchers, practitioners, students and the criminal justice community together to advance techniques in solving cold cases and assist families and law enforcement with solvability factors for unsolved homicides, missing persons, and kidnapping cases.
Social Links:
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:08):
Carla Deshaw. She is not a coroner. She is the
coroner of Lancaster County, South Carolina. You know when I
say coroner, she wasn't just a corner. She's been corner
of the year. When I tell you, this woman is fears.
(00:30):
She is always a good time honey. When I hang
out with miss Things. She is funny, she is smart,
she's down to earth. She's loyal, She's got your back
at all times. Another thing I love about her she
wants it done right, no matter what it is. Whether
(00:51):
it's training, searching, sending an email, or washing a horse,
she wants it done right. I'm not gonna get you
hemmed up. Everybody loves her. Everybody respects her. She's a
straight shooter. She's a wide open she's a good old
country gal. She has done some groundbreaking stuff and we're
(01:13):
gonna talk about some of it. But she's got education
on her radar at all times. She's had the law changed.
She does a team approach, and when I say team,
I'm talking about second to none. She's brought in doctor
Laura Pettler and todd Ellis and Evo and Lex and
Terry and Josh and the list goes on and own
(01:36):
and own. But one of the best things about her
she's married to my buddy t Bone, and we'll talk
about him too. But y'all please help me. Welcome Carla
Diste Zone seven.
Speaker 2 (01:51):
Thank you, Cheryl.
Speaker 3 (01:52):
I hope that I can live up to a quarter
of all the nice accolades that you said about me there.
Speaker 2 (01:58):
That was wonderful.
Speaker 3 (02:00):
You did forget to say though, that on my team
of excellent people, I also added Cheryl McCollum on there,
so thank you for being on our team as well.
Speaker 1 (02:11):
It is absolutely one of the highest honors of my
career and I mean that sincerely. Listen, I want to
talk about history making for a second, because you know,
you get into this line of work and we're going
to hear from you about how you got here. But
just right out of the gate, I want to tell
(02:31):
people that you have done something so extraordinary. You have
got the first mounted response unit in a.
Speaker 3 (02:40):
Coroner's office ever in history. Yes, it has been quite
a journey. It stemmed from an incident a year ago
where we were searching for a gentleman who unfortunately committed
suicide and he jumped into.
Speaker 2 (02:59):
A very rage river.
Speaker 3 (03:01):
The water at the time he jumped in was extremely
cold because it was in January and the water was
flowing at ninety three thousand gallons per minute, and our
chances of locating him were very, very slim without a
lot of resources. We knew that we had some pretty
(03:24):
steep terrain on both sides of these river banks, and
we had access to cadaver dogs, We had access to
lots of people, lots of equipment, you know, gators, flour wheelers,
people on foot, you name it. But there comes a
point in time there are some areas your gator is
(03:45):
too wide, or your side by side is too wide
to fit through there. People get tired, and of course
how are you going to get in there? And so
doctor Pittler, who is a great friend of mine and
a wonderful colleague, called because she knew about the search,
(04:06):
and she said, hey, if you need me to bring
my horse, we can come ride along the banks and
just probably get further than you guys can and be
happy to go take a look for you. And I
thought that's an excellent idea. So that is where it
was birthed. The idea was on our search for Tie.
(04:27):
And after the search was over and we located him.
Laura and I sat down and said, you know, this
is really something that we need, not just for that
that particular terrain, but for so many other things. You
have skeletal remains that are scattered out over the years,
(04:48):
and according to different animal activity. You know, they can
range from right there where you find the majority of
the body to scatter it out pretty far, especially if
you have coyotes your area, and so you need to
get to those areas and they're incredibly overgrown. We just
worked one a few months ago that the briers were
(05:10):
so intense none of the people on foot could penetrate.
Speaker 2 (05:14):
That area at all.
Speaker 3 (05:15):
But a horse such as a freezing or a gypsy
banner are designed to go through that kind of terrain
because of the hair on their legs, and that is
where the equine education became incredibly incredibly important from doctor Petler.
So we started developing this thinking what kind of horses
can we use. We need those types of horses, We
(05:38):
need draft horses so that if we respond to an
area may be affected by a hurricane where trees have
gone down. Absolutely we have our fire department there who
can bring equipment and chainsaws to cut all the trees down.
But again we're in small areas. When I say small,
(05:58):
I mean that's where your horses come in again, because
the fire department can walk down there with their chainsaws,
but they can't drive a pickup truck down there to
move the tree. But Yara, one of our draft horses,
she can pull it. Oh yeah, that's just one of
(06:21):
the many facets of what we do. And then we thought, well,
this isn't even though it's the first corner based unit,
it doesn't have to mean that somebody is deceased. So
when we were coming up with our ideas and with
our name, we didn't nail it down to rescue or recovery.
(06:44):
We said our name was mounted response Unit, because we're
going to respond whether it is relative to a deceitent
or whether it's relative to an autistic child or a
lost child, an elderly person who is lost or disoriented,
(07:06):
maybe a camper, maybe someone who is even run into
the woods, run away from abuse. We are going to
be able to get to them and find them alive
or deceased. And of course we would love to be
used more in life situation than deceased. We would like
(07:29):
to be there on the front end. But that is
our goal and we want to be multi purpose and
we are off to a fantastic start with that because
one thing is for certain, you can definitely upgrade and
things get better and better and better over time. That's
of course the name of the game. We have computers now,
(07:51):
we didn't before. You know, pen to paper and now,
so it gets better and better and better. But the
bottom line is you couldn't get to the part where
we are with computers and information in them without the
original pen and paper. You can't get to UTVs and
ATVs without the original source and which was a horse.
(08:16):
And so sometimes going back to basics is bringing it
all back home again. What's old is new again.
Speaker 1 (08:27):
And you know, one of the most incredible aspects is
you're ten feet in the air, so your fiel division
is much better on a horse than it is on
an ATV or on foot. You would be able to
see evidence, you'd be able to see tracks, you'd be
able to see possibly the person that is correct.
Speaker 3 (08:45):
And then you have the benefit of you have all
of your senses, but you also have another mammal who
has incredibly keen senses. Now you have a partner that
has senses as well, and they're different. It's a different
(09:07):
skill set of senses than your skill set. But if
you put two of those together, your chance is double.
Speaker 1 (09:17):
Amen. I've had some partners that were some jackasses.
Speaker 2 (09:21):
That's a whole different team.
Speaker 3 (09:22):
And that one's already been invented nationwide.
Speaker 1 (09:26):
So it's nice to have a horse. But let me
I want you to really tell people. This is the
part that I am so excited about. When you look
at just the miraculous thing that you have been able
to do. Tell them about these horses, where they came from,
(09:46):
what Laura saw in them, and how they got from
where they were to where they are now.
Speaker 3 (09:52):
Oh, I'll absolutely be happy to And Laura knows so
much more about them. Obviously she and Todd are very
involved in it. But I will tell you what I know.
As we got going and started thinking about what we needed,
it became really clear that we needed a couple of
(10:12):
different styles of horses. One of the best places is
much like people. Your best people sometimes are often in
the shadows. And sometimes remember when I said.
Speaker 2 (10:26):
What's old is new again?
Speaker 3 (10:29):
You know, being a woman over fifty, I'm in that
category too, Like just because I'm older doesn't mean I'm
not valuable, and Laura and Todd started going to Unfortunately,
we still have meat auctions, slaughter auctions for horses in
(10:51):
the United States, and there were some beautiful, very worthy
and capable horses who were just up for auction to
go be slaughtered, and Laura and Todd started going and
(11:12):
bidding on them and rescuing them. So our team, it's
very ironic, is built of horses who are rescued and
now they're being trained to use in rescue missions. So
(11:32):
their work is definitely not done and their worth is
now highlighted exponentially through our group. We praise them and
love them and give them the absolute.
Speaker 2 (11:50):
Best care possible.
Speaker 3 (11:52):
And you can literally look in their eyes when you
go to feed them or give them treats, or brush
them or just walk behind tell them hello. They know
that their worth is now being showcased.
Speaker 1 (12:09):
Y'all. Let me tell you something. She took it a
step further. She swore them in. She swore the horses
in as deputy corners.
Speaker 2 (12:22):
They have badges.
Speaker 1 (12:25):
What that did in that moment her genius. She knew
now they are federally protected, they will never be abused
again by law, and I gotta tell you, it was
one of the most heartwarming and beautiful swearing ends I've
(12:48):
ever been to, and I've been to a bunch of them,
but that one, especially with you know, Yara in the barn,
I don't know that. That was just an incredible evening.
And all I can say is thank you, thank you
for including all us in that moment.
Speaker 3 (13:07):
Well, thank you so much for being part of this team.
I had no idea how the team would evolve, who
would be on the team, and doctor Petler was incredibly
instrumental in that. And then to start seeing it all
come together, and with all of the variety of people
(13:31):
we have in the skill sets and the expertise, it
just made for an incredible, incredible team. And for your audience,
we should also tell them our team doesn't just have criminal,
forensic and corner expertise on it. I actually wanted to
(13:55):
put some thought into that, and so I actually asked
for volunteer your medics to be part of that as well.
They will sit at base camp and if we do
find someone who's injured, all we do is radio back
to base camp until another rider. Hey load up one
of our medics with a jump bag, bring them out
(14:17):
to us in the same breath. We are going to
start training with our cadaver team, and those horses will
be able to also bring a cadaver dog and their handlers.
Speaker 2 (14:33):
So, for instance, if we find a.
Speaker 3 (14:36):
Human rib, but we need to find the rest, that
is where you worn't smart. Again, what's old is new.
You could fly a drone all day long, and they're
incredibly valuable, but that drone will never ever outshine a
(14:58):
dog's news. A properly trained K nine will take you
to all the right places.
Speaker 1 (15:07):
I had a buddy he works for TSA. He told
me the other day he said, Cheryl, you know when
you get home and you open the door and you
can smell that wat's been making his spaghetti and you
instantly recognize it. And I said absolutely, He said, my
dog can smell the salt in that spaghetti.
Speaker 2 (15:26):
See, that's absolutely perfect. That is what they do.
Speaker 3 (15:31):
You know, we think that our eyes are phenomenal, but
you would be incredibly surprised. What we can just step
right over We don't see. But again, it takes a village, right,
So it's not that one division or one animal is
better than the other. It is that each one of
(15:53):
those people have a respective place on the team, and
I often refer to it as a rece your only
your leg of the journey is only as good as
the person that handed it off to you and the
one awaiting to receive. So you better stack your team
(16:14):
with good givers and good receivers.
Speaker 1 (16:20):
Let's get into you for a second, because you know,
most people in the second third grade don't say, man,
I want to grow up to be a coroner. You know,
maybe police officer, teacher, firefighter. How did you get into this?
Speaker 3 (16:36):
So, I too did not grow up wanting to be
a corner, that's for sure. I didn't even know what
it was when I was that young. I always thought
I wanted to be a veterinarian until I realized that
part of that duty was having to say goodbye to animals,
and that was hard enough on my own. I sure
didn't want to be the one to have to administer that,
(16:57):
So I went on to a jack of all trades
career line for multiple years. I've done a lot of
different things, all of which shaped me to be who
I am today and be as diverse as I am.
So in two thousand and one, my mother had her
(17:20):
last bout with my a Lloyd leukemia, and when she
was in the hospital I knew then because her care
team was incredibly amazing, and I thought, you know, I
really want to pay it forward. I want to do
that as well. So I took a job at our
local hospital as a padio respiratory tech, and then I
(17:42):
actually entered school for respiratory therapy. My college years were
focused on criminal justice, and that was several years before them.
And there was during my downtime in between seeing patients
on newspaper was on the table and there was an
(18:04):
ad in there for a part time deputy coroner, and
I thought, well, that's interesting.
Speaker 2 (18:12):
I wonder what you.
Speaker 1 (18:13):
Have to do to do that.
Speaker 3 (18:16):
And so that was in two thousand and five, and
I thought, you know, at the time.
Speaker 1 (18:22):
I.
Speaker 3 (18:24):
Didn't have anything going on except for plenty of time
to work, right, And I thought, well, I don't need
a third job, but I'm gonna try it. I'm just
gonna apply. And so I applied for it. And from
the how I left the office in where I applied
to my home was about a twenty five minute drive,
(18:45):
and I made us stop at the grocery store in
my local town and as I put in the parking
lot of the grocery store, my phone rang and it
was the employer offering me a position.
Speaker 1 (18:57):
And so.
Speaker 3 (18:59):
That that's how I got into the deputy coroner field
because as I was paying paying it forward for my
mother at the hospital, that popped in and it was
half medical, half legal. It's kind of where you need
to be to be in this field. You need to
know a little bit about criminal work and investigations, and
(19:21):
you need to know a little bit about medical. And
so that's how I landed in this field. That was
in two thousand and five. I worked part time for
two years. In two thousand and seven, the man who
was corner put in for that position to go to
full time, and so it was the first full time
(19:44):
position aside from the role of quarner, that this county
had awarded in the Corner's office. So I became the
first full time employee besides him, and I became the
first chief deputy quarter ever named for this Corner's office.
(20:06):
Fast forward, I wanted to do more education wise, and
so I learned about ABMDI and I became abmd I certified,
which is the American Board of Medico legal death investigators.
Speaker 2 (20:20):
That's that. Back to that half medical, half legal.
Speaker 1 (20:25):
That's right.
Speaker 3 (20:26):
I became the first one certified in our county. And
then in twenty sixteen, my boss was ready to take
it easy and retire, so I ran for the office
of corner And again, none of these, I tell you,
(20:46):
these were all firsts. I never set out for it
to be a first. I usually find that out after
I've already done it. And so once I ran for coigner,
I won there. I didn't have any opposition either, So
don't let me make you think that I had this
(21:08):
grand competition out there.
Speaker 2 (21:10):
I didn't.
Speaker 3 (21:11):
Nobody else wanted this job, but I was the only
one that had any interest in signing up. And so
once I was won the election and I was sworn
in January of twenty seventeen, it dawned on me in February,
I think, like a month later, I say, oh, you
know what, I just now realized, since the inception of
(21:34):
Lancaster County, South Carolina, I'm the first woman to ever
be a coroner here. And so that's why I tell
you some of these moments of first hit me at
the end, you know, and I think, oh, okay, which
I'm glad they do, because I never want my mission
to be focused on being the first. My mission is
(21:58):
focused on public service, serving my families with honor, integrity,
and pride, and finding the facts and providing the truth.
And it doesn't always suit everyone's palate. I understand that,
but the truth is the truth, and my job is
(22:20):
to find it.
Speaker 1 (22:23):
Are there cases that stay with you, Carla?
Speaker 3 (22:26):
There are there are for multiple reasons. There are good
ones and bad ones. I think we all have those.
There are cases that I wish there was more than
circumstantial evidence because I know it's I know what happened,
but there's not enough to put forward to our solicitor's office,
(22:52):
which South Carolina still uses the term solicitor everywhere else
district attorney. There's not enough information but forward, and there's
just not enough information to be had because some people
are pretty good at committing a crime and covering it up.
Speaker 2 (23:12):
So those will always bother me.
Speaker 3 (23:15):
Children who are abused and die from that abuse. That
is very that stays with me. Cases that are undetermined,
those stay with me because I just when you don't know,
you don't know if there's no indication, and a lot
of people say, well, you gotta know what happened.
Speaker 2 (23:34):
You really don't.
Speaker 3 (23:35):
Because if you find somebody in a pool who has
enough water in their lungs to be a drowning, but
they also have enough drugs in their system being overdose,
which came first, you don't know.
Speaker 1 (23:50):
They are out there. I mean there are times you
cannot shave for one hundred percent certainty, you cannot.
Speaker 3 (23:56):
Correct, correct, and then you have impactful cases. Is that
have a positive impact. When you find out.
Speaker 2 (24:03):
The absolute cause of death.
Speaker 3 (24:07):
Then that information can be put forth in the public
health arena, and you know that you worked a death case,
but you provided data to promote living.
Speaker 1 (24:23):
A lot of people don't know that, Carla. Like when
you hear the seat belt laws and things like that.
In the air bags, those come from corners and medical
examiner y'all.
Speaker 3 (24:35):
The air bag case that finally caused the huge recall
was actually a corner investigative case. It was the ninth
when it happened. It was the ninth in the nation,
the eleventh.
Speaker 2 (24:52):
In the world.
Speaker 3 (24:53):
And although the other nine and eleven, respectively, were air bags,
they knew that it was a component from the air bag,
but nobody could really prove it prove it, but it
was thought to be so, and that's just kind of
where that stayed. So when the ninth and eleventh one happened,
(25:18):
and I say that respectively, ninth in the nation, eleventh
in the world. When that particular case happened, the corner
sent that person for eyetopesy, had the shrapnel removed, then
went to the junk yard where the car the vehicle
truck was being held, pulled the air bag canister out
(25:42):
of that, drove it, and drove the shrapnel to Duluth, Georgia,
to a lab that specialized in molecular makeup of metals,
kind of like human DNA, right right, took both pieces,
had them studied, had it proven one hundred percent that yes,
(26:05):
the piece of metal that killed the driver, that was
pulled from his neck was indeed the piece of metal
metal that came from the airbag canister that closed it up.
Because there was no denying, there was no speculation from
the other side saying, well you really can't prove it. Well,
(26:28):
it was proven then, and I can speak that language,
and I can speak it well versed, and I know
it like the back of my hand, because that case
was mine, right.
Speaker 1 (26:41):
On that is remarkable.
Speaker 3 (26:46):
Negative things definitely stay with me. Positives due to because
that got put forth to Nitsa, that got put forth
into the entire world, and it forced to Katta to
be accountable. It forced them to look into their product,
(27:09):
to do the proper recalls, to send out the notifications
to everyone that had one of their faulty airbags to
go to the service dealer and have it changed, updated, upgraded,
potentially saving lives.
Speaker 1 (27:27):
Carla, I've never heard that. I'm sitting here just gobsmacked,
So thank you for that. Again. You have no idea
how many lives you saved.
Speaker 3 (27:38):
I don't, And even if it's just one, that's all
I care about. My job is to make sure because
one thing I cannot change, I cannot change death. By
the time my phone rings and my response is required,
(27:59):
that is an eerie event. But what I can change
after that is how we handle the next one, how
we put that information forward, how we put it in
motion to protect health of the future generations. My office
(28:23):
is very advanced as far as the number of autopsies
and toxicology studies that we do, and we do that
because every bit of that data we can collect will
not only help the public, but I also have family
members who are biological and I can say, listen, we
(28:48):
did this study your autopsy. You know, did you know
that your parents had you know this disease or that
when some of them may be dormant, didn't know about
Did you know that there was cardiovascular disease?
Speaker 2 (29:06):
Is it hereditary?
Speaker 3 (29:07):
Is it not?
Speaker 2 (29:07):
I don't know. But what I can tell you is this.
Speaker 3 (29:11):
Here are all of your findings. You are thirty five
years old, take them, Have your family physician, your cardiologist, whomever,
make a copy of this and place it on your chart,
so that your health can start being monitored based on
the history of your loved one and potentially could be
(29:35):
on the radar, and potentially you could have some preventive
measures long before you even have a problem.
Speaker 2 (29:44):
That part of what I do.
Speaker 3 (29:47):
Absolutely love because promoting good health for anyone surrounding these
families and helping them is pretty remarkable in the wake
of an end of life event.
Speaker 1 (30:05):
I told y'all you were going to love her, and
I bet y'all had no idea that that was the
kind of thing she was helping people with.
Speaker 4 (30:17):
How could a beautiful, young first grade teacher be stabbed
twenty times, including in the bat allegedly die of suicide. Yes,
that was the medical examiner's official ruling after a closed
door meeting.
Speaker 1 (30:32):
He first named it a homicide.
Speaker 4 (30:35):
Why what happened to Ellen Greenberg a huge American miscarriage
of justice. For an in depth look at the facts,
see what Happened to Ellen on Amazon. All proceeds to
the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children.
Speaker 1 (30:57):
So listen, let's talk about one last And it's to me,
the worst part of the job, and that's the death
notification I've had to give some I've had the training.
I remember in Atlanta. You know, we're all out there,
me and Leslie all love us, and this poor guy
(31:18):
he didn't want to be there. You could tell he
didn't want to be there. And he was like giving
a scenario. So he said he would knock on the
door and say, are you the wid of Jones? Oh
my gosh, Kay, Kate just bust out with that, you know.
So then he kind of got more comfortable with it,
and you know, they said, look, this is the thing.
(31:40):
You've got to knock on the door, and you've got
to say are you mister or missus? So and so
I regret to inform you you've had a loved one killed.
Like you can't say passed on, you can't so gone beyond,
like You've got to be very clear. They have died,
they have been killed, you know, car wreck whatever. And
(32:00):
he was the first one of us out of that
class that actually got the call and had to give
a death notification. And he said that walking up to
the door, he was just practicing all the steps that
he remembered. You know, are you, miss so and so
I regret to inform you, you know, blah blah. So
(32:20):
we got to the door. He knocked on the door
and he said, or you, missus Smith, and she said yes,
And he said, I regret to inform you your son
was killed in a car accident on Treasure Bridge about
three point thirty this afternoon. And she looked at him
and that was it. He thought, I delivered it perfectly.
I've done everything right. And she said which one? He
(32:46):
had forgotten the victim's name in his panic, in his stress.
You know, it's a horrible thing. I mean, you're walking
to a door knowing you're fixing to destroy somebody's life,
you know, with a four hour training ain't gonna get
you ready for that. So here's what I want to
ask you the death edifications. Do you have a rhythm
(33:10):
of how you do it? And then the last thing
I want you to tie in because I've seen it
and when you talk about yes, the worst thing has happened,
but there is a positive, and Carla, there is always
a positive. Sometimes we got to look mighty hard, but
there is a positive. And I saw it with you
(33:31):
with the bond that you made with Ty's family.
Speaker 2 (33:35):
So I will tell you.
Speaker 3 (33:38):
I'm the training director for the State of South Carolina
Coroners Association, so we have forty six counties and I
am the responsible person for hosting state trainings. They can
get education all kinds of places, but our state ones.
(33:59):
I do that and they have an opportunity to come.
Speaker 2 (34:02):
I tell you that.
Speaker 3 (34:03):
To tell you this, out of several trainings a year,
the one thing that I cannot teach them is how
to make that notification easy.
Speaker 2 (34:17):
I will tell you.
Speaker 3 (34:18):
I am in my twentieth year. I vividly remember the
first time I made a notification and I knocked on
the door. I did it, but I can remember feeling
like it was an out of body experience because it
is not in human nature, it is not in our
(34:41):
comfort zone. I can tell you that was twenty years ago,
and I can tell you that if another county caused
me tonight, or if I have a call and I
go out and I have to do a notification, I
can tell you twenty years ago, I can tell you
(35:02):
how far up in my throat my stomach was, and
I can tell you that tonight my stomach will be
in the same spot in my throat. Because that knock
on the door, that notification never changes ever, and if
(35:26):
it does change, you probably need to seek some professional
help in your days, and these professions are probably done
because if it ever gets to a time that that
is easy for you, you have lost your human compassion
(35:47):
and it's time to back out of that. So I
one hundred percent, wholeheartedly agree with you. My rhythm is this,
I go to the home wherever it is, and I
actually start with that decedent's name because I have that
(36:08):
fear of losing it. So I knock on that door
and I will say when they open the door, I
will say I am looking for relatives of John Day,
and the person answering the door will say I'm his mother, father,
whatever the relationship is. Right, then I go ahead and say,
(36:30):
my name is Carla D's and I am the coroner
from Lancaster County.
Speaker 2 (36:35):
I am here to tell you.
Speaker 3 (36:38):
That your son, or I may call him by name,
I'll either call him by relationship or name. Either one
was involved in a vehicle accident today, and unfortunately he
did not survive. Your son died at whatever time I
use that word, died dead, not passed away, not any
(37:00):
of these soft words. Those have a time and a place, clear,
concise and direct. It does not mean that you don't
have compassion. That compassion comes immediately after that, once they
collect themselves, because that takes a minute. My next words are,
(37:22):
I am here to help you in whatever manner I
can tell me at this moment in time, what I
can do for you, Beautiful, I always when I'm training
my own folks. Here, here's how I want you to relate.
Somebody has just spilled every egg out of their basket.
(37:44):
When you give them that news, your job is to
help them put their eggs back in the basket. Some
of it comes slowly, and you may not get every
egg back in there. Ironically, that is how I knew
the family tie Tai's mother, Chante, had a couple of
(38:07):
deaths in her family over the years. I happened to
be the one to work them. On this particular night,
this particular afternoon, I was giving a heads up that
we had someone who jumped over the bridge and it
was witnessed by multiple drivers a very busy highway, and
I said, oh, gosh, okay, call me if we can
(38:30):
do anything for you guys, because at the time, that's
what you have. You have someone who jumped and they
don't have a sighting on him. Unfortunately, someone in the
mix of emergency response, because the family knew that he
had jumped, because it was witnessed. It was witnessed by
(38:50):
actually some other family members who had just left the
same place he did. Unfortunately, someone said to the family, well,
we think we can we put a camera down there.
We think we see his body. Okay, that's a no no,
because you don't know what you don't know, And they
(39:12):
couldn't say they definitively saw him. They just saw something
in the water. This is murky water. It has all
kinds of stuff in it. It's rolling at ninety three
thousand gallons a second, you know it's impossible. With that
being said, then you have opened the door of the
(39:33):
corner has got to step in. So I go to
the scene, and then I went up on the bridge
and I talked to the family and I realized it
was Shante, his mother, and of course I hugged her in.
I said, listen, I don't know. We don't have a
sighting on a body. However, we are going to look
(39:56):
and give it our all. And that's how I got
a and I stayed involved, and I stayed involved for
nineteen days until we recovered him. And we recovered him
courtesy of our cadaver team and a phenomenal, phenomenal expert
with them, Dave Mylon and Dave organized what we were
(40:21):
doing that morning, and our fire departments got in their
boots and put their crews on them. They put the
dog handlers and the dogs on the boats, and they
executed the plan that Dave laid out perfectly, and within
(40:41):
two and a half hours, not even that much. It
was probably within an hour after our planning and getting
in the boats and them getting all of their directives
from Dave, it was an under an hour we had him.
That's where the horse team was born, and of course
our public unveil for the horse team. Ty had a
(41:02):
child who was born roughly a month after he died,
and that baby was there at the unveiling. So all
of his kids were there, but particularly the baby who
never met his dad, got to be part of what
his dad inspired, and.
Speaker 1 (41:20):
They loved those horses.
Speaker 2 (41:22):
They did well.
Speaker 1 (41:24):
I cannot thank you enough for allowing me to be
a part of your team, and for you being a
part of my Zone seven.
Speaker 3 (41:32):
Well, Cheryl, I cannot thank you enough for thinking of
me and allowing to be part of something so incredible
and so great. The work you do is phenomenal, and
the education you put out there is incredible, and your
work speaks for itself. So to be part of your
(41:55):
Zone seven is just quite an honor. I very much
appreciate it.
Speaker 1 (42:02):
All right, give my buddy a hug, I will, y'all.
I'm gonna end Zone seven the way that I always
do with a quote. And before I do that, I
got to tell you it's kind of funny hearing you
call me Cheryl.
Speaker 3 (42:15):
Well, you know, I didn't want to just call you Mac.
I thought I needed to be proper. But anyway, thanks
happy to be all your jeam.
Speaker 1 (42:24):
It is all good, It's just funny. I'm like, I
don't think I've ever heard her call me that. I'm
going to end Zone seven the way that I always
do with a quote. There are a few who envy me.
They want to know what they have to do to
get my job to be who I am. It's only death,
(42:44):
How hard can it be? They say? Here, I silently reply,
take it all, every fester and remnant of the people
no one cared about in life, much less death, all
the broken children who will never know that I grieved
for them. Take it off. Just leave me my car
(43:07):
key so I can get home permanently. Somebody else can
listen to the bullshit. Death loves dispute. He never shuts up.
Joseph Scott Morgan, Blood Beneath my Feet The journey of
a Southern death investigator. I'm Cheryl McCollum, and this is
(43:30):
own Saven.
Carla Deshaw. She is not a coroner. She is the
coroner of Lancaster County, South Carolina. You know when I
say coroner, she wasn't just a corner. She's been corner
of the year. When I tell you, this woman is fears.
(00:30):
She is always a good time honey. When I hang
out with miss Things. She is funny, she is smart,
she's down to earth. She's loyal, She's got your back
at all times. Another thing I love about her she
wants it done right, no matter what it is. Whether
(00:51):
it's training, searching, sending an email, or washing a horse,
she wants it done right. I'm not gonna get you
hemmed up. Everybody loves her. Everybody respects her. She's a
straight shooter. She's a wide open she's a good old
country gal. She has done some groundbreaking stuff and we're
(01:13):
gonna talk about some of it. But she's got education
on her radar at all times. She's had the law changed.
She does a team approach, and when I say team,
I'm talking about second to none. She's brought in doctor
Laura Pettler and todd Ellis and Evo and Lex and
Terry and Josh and the list goes on and own
(01:36):
and own. But one of the best things about her
she's married to my buddy t Bone, and we'll talk
about him too. But y'all please help me. Welcome Carla
Diste Zone seven.
Speaker 2 (01:51):
Thank you, Cheryl.
Speaker 3 (01:52):
I hope that I can live up to a quarter
of all the nice accolades that you said about me there.
Speaker 2 (01:58):
That was wonderful.
Speaker 3 (02:00):
You did forget to say though, that on my team
of excellent people, I also added Cheryl McCollum on there,
so thank you for being on our team as well.
Speaker 1 (02:11):
It is absolutely one of the highest honors of my
career and I mean that sincerely. Listen, I want to
talk about history making for a second, because you know,
you get into this line of work and we're going
to hear from you about how you got here. But
just right out of the gate, I want to tell
(02:31):
people that you have done something so extraordinary. You have
got the first mounted response unit in a.
Speaker 3 (02:40):
Coroner's office ever in history. Yes, it has been quite
a journey. It stemmed from an incident a year ago
where we were searching for a gentleman who unfortunately committed
suicide and he jumped into.
Speaker 2 (02:59):
A very rage river.
Speaker 3 (03:01):
The water at the time he jumped in was extremely
cold because it was in January and the water was
flowing at ninety three thousand gallons per minute, and our
chances of locating him were very, very slim without a
lot of resources. We knew that we had some pretty
(03:24):
steep terrain on both sides of these river banks, and
we had access to cadaver dogs, We had access to
lots of people, lots of equipment, you know, gators, flour wheelers,
people on foot, you name it. But there comes a
point in time there are some areas your gator is
(03:45):
too wide, or your side by side is too wide
to fit through there. People get tired, and of course
how are you going to get in there? And so
doctor Pittler, who is a great friend of mine and
a wonderful colleague, called because she knew about the search,
(04:06):
and she said, hey, if you need me to bring
my horse, we can come ride along the banks and
just probably get further than you guys can and be
happy to go take a look for you. And I
thought that's an excellent idea. So that is where it
was birthed. The idea was on our search for Tie.
(04:27):
And after the search was over and we located him.
Laura and I sat down and said, you know, this
is really something that we need, not just for that
that particular terrain, but for so many other things. You
have skeletal remains that are scattered out over the years,
(04:48):
and according to different animal activity. You know, they can
range from right there where you find the majority of
the body to scatter it out pretty far, especially if
you have coyotes your area, and so you need to
get to those areas and they're incredibly overgrown. We just
worked one a few months ago that the briers were
(05:10):
so intense none of the people on foot could penetrate.
Speaker 2 (05:14):
That area at all.
Speaker 3 (05:15):
But a horse such as a freezing or a gypsy
banner are designed to go through that kind of terrain
because of the hair on their legs, and that is
where the equine education became incredibly incredibly important from doctor Petler.
So we started developing this thinking what kind of horses
can we use. We need those types of horses, We
(05:38):
need draft horses so that if we respond to an
area may be affected by a hurricane where trees have
gone down. Absolutely we have our fire department there who
can bring equipment and chainsaws to cut all the trees down.
But again we're in small areas. When I say small,
(05:58):
I mean that's where your horses come in again, because
the fire department can walk down there with their chainsaws,
but they can't drive a pickup truck down there to
move the tree. But Yara, one of our draft horses,
she can pull it. Oh yeah, that's just one of
(06:21):
the many facets of what we do. And then we thought, well,
this isn't even though it's the first corner based unit,
it doesn't have to mean that somebody is deceased. So
when we were coming up with our ideas and with
our name, we didn't nail it down to rescue or recovery.
(06:44):
We said our name was mounted response Unit, because we're
going to respond whether it is relative to a deceitent
or whether it's relative to an autistic child or a
lost child, an elderly person who is lost or disoriented,
(07:06):
maybe a camper, maybe someone who is even run into
the woods, run away from abuse. We are going to
be able to get to them and find them alive
or deceased. And of course we would love to be
used more in life situation than deceased. We would like
(07:29):
to be there on the front end. But that is
our goal and we want to be multi purpose and
we are off to a fantastic start with that because
one thing is for certain, you can definitely upgrade and
things get better and better and better over time. That's
of course the name of the game. We have computers now,
(07:51):
we didn't before. You know, pen to paper and now,
so it gets better and better and better. But the
bottom line is you couldn't get to the part where
we are with computers and information in them without the
original pen and paper. You can't get to UTVs and
ATVs without the original source and which was a horse.
(08:16):
And so sometimes going back to basics is bringing it
all back home again. What's old is new again.
Speaker 1 (08:27):
And you know, one of the most incredible aspects is
you're ten feet in the air, so your fiel division
is much better on a horse than it is on
an ATV or on foot. You would be able to
see evidence, you'd be able to see tracks, you'd be
able to see possibly the person that is correct.
Speaker 3 (08:45):
And then you have the benefit of you have all
of your senses, but you also have another mammal who
has incredibly keen senses. Now you have a partner that
has senses as well, and they're different. It's a different
(09:07):
skill set of senses than your skill set. But if
you put two of those together, your chance is double.
Speaker 1 (09:17):
Amen. I've had some partners that were some jackasses.
Speaker 2 (09:21):
That's a whole different team.
Speaker 3 (09:22):
And that one's already been invented nationwide.
Speaker 1 (09:26):
So it's nice to have a horse. But let me
I want you to really tell people. This is the
part that I am so excited about. When you look
at just the miraculous thing that you have been able
to do. Tell them about these horses, where they came from,
(09:46):
what Laura saw in them, and how they got from
where they were to where they are now.
Speaker 3 (09:52):
Oh, I'll absolutely be happy to And Laura knows so
much more about them. Obviously she and Todd are very
involved in it. But I will tell you what I know.
As we got going and started thinking about what we needed,
it became really clear that we needed a couple of
(10:12):
different styles of horses. One of the best places is
much like people. Your best people sometimes are often in
the shadows. And sometimes remember when I said.
Speaker 2 (10:26):
What's old is new again?
Speaker 3 (10:29):
You know, being a woman over fifty, I'm in that
category too, Like just because I'm older doesn't mean I'm
not valuable, and Laura and Todd started going to Unfortunately,
we still have meat auctions, slaughter auctions for horses in
(10:51):
the United States, and there were some beautiful, very worthy
and capable horses who were just up for auction to
go be slaughtered, and Laura and Todd started going and
(11:12):
bidding on them and rescuing them. So our team, it's
very ironic, is built of horses who are rescued and
now they're being trained to use in rescue missions. So
(11:32):
their work is definitely not done and their worth is
now highlighted exponentially through our group. We praise them and
love them and give them the absolute.
Speaker 2 (11:50):
Best care possible.
Speaker 3 (11:52):
And you can literally look in their eyes when you
go to feed them or give them treats, or brush
them or just walk behind tell them hello. They know
that their worth is now being showcased.
Speaker 1 (12:09):
Y'all. Let me tell you something. She took it a
step further. She swore them in. She swore the horses
in as deputy corners.
Speaker 2 (12:22):
They have badges.
Speaker 1 (12:25):
What that did in that moment her genius. She knew
now they are federally protected, they will never be abused
again by law, and I gotta tell you, it was
one of the most heartwarming and beautiful swearing ends I've
(12:48):
ever been to, and I've been to a bunch of them,
but that one, especially with you know, Yara in the barn,
I don't know that. That was just an incredible evening.
And all I can say is thank you, thank you
for including all us in that moment.
Speaker 3 (13:07):
Well, thank you so much for being part of this team.
I had no idea how the team would evolve, who
would be on the team, and doctor Petler was incredibly
instrumental in that. And then to start seeing it all
come together, and with all of the variety of people
(13:31):
we have in the skill sets and the expertise, it
just made for an incredible, incredible team. And for your audience,
we should also tell them our team doesn't just have criminal,
forensic and corner expertise on it. I actually wanted to
(13:55):
put some thought into that, and so I actually asked
for volunteer your medics to be part of that as well.
They will sit at base camp and if we do
find someone who's injured, all we do is radio back
to base camp until another rider. Hey load up one
of our medics with a jump bag, bring them out
(14:17):
to us in the same breath. We are going to
start training with our cadaver team, and those horses will
be able to also bring a cadaver dog and their handlers.
Speaker 2 (14:33):
So, for instance, if we find a.
Speaker 3 (14:36):
Human rib, but we need to find the rest, that
is where you worn't smart. Again, what's old is new.
You could fly a drone all day long, and they're
incredibly valuable, but that drone will never ever outshine a
(14:58):
dog's news. A properly trained K nine will take you
to all the right places.
Speaker 1 (15:07):
I had a buddy he works for TSA. He told
me the other day he said, Cheryl, you know when
you get home and you open the door and you
can smell that wat's been making his spaghetti and you
instantly recognize it. And I said absolutely, He said, my
dog can smell the salt in that spaghetti.
Speaker 2 (15:26):
See, that's absolutely perfect. That is what they do.
Speaker 3 (15:31):
You know, we think that our eyes are phenomenal, but
you would be incredibly surprised. What we can just step
right over We don't see. But again, it takes a village, right,
So it's not that one division or one animal is
better than the other. It is that each one of
(15:53):
those people have a respective place on the team, and
I often refer to it as a rece your only
your leg of the journey is only as good as
the person that handed it off to you and the
one awaiting to receive. So you better stack your team
(16:14):
with good givers and good receivers.
Speaker 1 (16:20):
Let's get into you for a second, because you know,
most people in the second third grade don't say, man,
I want to grow up to be a coroner. You know,
maybe police officer, teacher, firefighter. How did you get into this?
Speaker 3 (16:36):
So, I too did not grow up wanting to be
a corner, that's for sure. I didn't even know what
it was when I was that young. I always thought
I wanted to be a veterinarian until I realized that
part of that duty was having to say goodbye to animals,
and that was hard enough on my own. I sure
didn't want to be the one to have to administer that,
(16:57):
So I went on to a jack of all trades
career line for multiple years. I've done a lot of
different things, all of which shaped me to be who
I am today and be as diverse as I am.
So in two thousand and one, my mother had her
(17:20):
last bout with my a Lloyd leukemia, and when she
was in the hospital I knew then because her care
team was incredibly amazing, and I thought, you know, I
really want to pay it forward. I want to do
that as well. So I took a job at our
local hospital as a padio respiratory tech, and then I
(17:42):
actually entered school for respiratory therapy. My college years were
focused on criminal justice, and that was several years before them.
And there was during my downtime in between seeing patients
on newspaper was on the table and there was an
(18:04):
ad in there for a part time deputy coroner, and
I thought, well, that's interesting.
Speaker 2 (18:12):
I wonder what you.
Speaker 1 (18:13):
Have to do to do that.
Speaker 3 (18:16):
And so that was in two thousand and five, and
I thought, you know, at the time.
Speaker 1 (18:22):
I.
Speaker 3 (18:24):
Didn't have anything going on except for plenty of time
to work, right, And I thought, well, I don't need
a third job, but I'm gonna try it. I'm just
gonna apply. And so I applied for it. And from
the how I left the office in where I applied
to my home was about a twenty five minute drive,
(18:45):
and I made us stop at the grocery store in
my local town and as I put in the parking
lot of the grocery store, my phone rang and it
was the employer offering me a position.
Speaker 1 (18:57):
And so.
Speaker 3 (18:59):
That that's how I got into the deputy coroner field
because as I was paying paying it forward for my
mother at the hospital, that popped in and it was
half medical, half legal. It's kind of where you need
to be to be in this field. You need to
know a little bit about criminal work and investigations, and
(19:21):
you need to know a little bit about medical. And
so that's how I landed in this field. That was
in two thousand and five. I worked part time for
two years. In two thousand and seven, the man who
was corner put in for that position to go to
full time, and so it was the first full time
(19:44):
position aside from the role of quarner, that this county
had awarded in the Corner's office. So I became the
first full time employee besides him, and I became the
first chief deputy quarter ever named for this Corner's office.
(20:06):
Fast forward, I wanted to do more education wise, and
so I learned about ABMDI and I became abmd I certified,
which is the American Board of Medico legal death investigators.
Speaker 2 (20:20):
That's that. Back to that half medical, half legal.
Speaker 1 (20:25):
That's right.
Speaker 3 (20:26):
I became the first one certified in our county. And
then in twenty sixteen, my boss was ready to take
it easy and retire, so I ran for the office
of corner And again, none of these, I tell you,
(20:46):
these were all firsts. I never set out for it
to be a first. I usually find that out after
I've already done it. And so once I ran for coigner,
I won there. I didn't have any opposition either, So
don't let me make you think that I had this
(21:08):
grand competition out there.
Speaker 2 (21:10):
I didn't.
Speaker 3 (21:11):
Nobody else wanted this job, but I was the only
one that had any interest in signing up. And so
once I was won the election and I was sworn
in January of twenty seventeen, it dawned on me in February,
I think, like a month later, I say, oh, you
know what, I just now realized, since the inception of
(21:34):
Lancaster County, South Carolina, I'm the first woman to ever
be a coroner here. And so that's why I tell
you some of these moments of first hit me at
the end, you know, and I think, oh, okay, which
I'm glad they do, because I never want my mission
to be focused on being the first. My mission is
(21:58):
focused on public service, serving my families with honor, integrity,
and pride, and finding the facts and providing the truth.
And it doesn't always suit everyone's palate. I understand that,
but the truth is the truth, and my job is
(22:20):
to find it.
Speaker 1 (22:23):
Are there cases that stay with you, Carla?
Speaker 3 (22:26):
There are there are for multiple reasons. There are good
ones and bad ones. I think we all have those.
There are cases that I wish there was more than
circumstantial evidence because I know it's I know what happened,
but there's not enough to put forward to our solicitor's office,
(22:52):
which South Carolina still uses the term solicitor everywhere else
district attorney. There's not enough information but forward, and there's
just not enough information to be had because some people
are pretty good at committing a crime and covering it up.
Speaker 2 (23:12):
So those will always bother me.
Speaker 3 (23:15):
Children who are abused and die from that abuse. That
is very that stays with me. Cases that are undetermined,
those stay with me because I just when you don't know,
you don't know if there's no indication, and a lot
of people say, well, you gotta know what happened.
Speaker 2 (23:34):
You really don't.
Speaker 3 (23:35):
Because if you find somebody in a pool who has
enough water in their lungs to be a drowning, but
they also have enough drugs in their system being overdose,
which came first, you don't know.
Speaker 1 (23:50):
They are out there. I mean there are times you
cannot shave for one hundred percent certainty, you cannot.
Speaker 3 (23:56):
Correct, correct, and then you have impactful cases. Is that
have a positive impact. When you find out.
Speaker 2 (24:03):
The absolute cause of death.
Speaker 3 (24:07):
Then that information can be put forth in the public
health arena, and you know that you worked a death case,
but you provided data to promote living.
Speaker 1 (24:23):
A lot of people don't know that, Carla. Like when
you hear the seat belt laws and things like that.
In the air bags, those come from corners and medical
examiner y'all.
Speaker 3 (24:35):
The air bag case that finally caused the huge recall
was actually a corner investigative case. It was the ninth
when it happened. It was the ninth in the nation,
the eleventh.
Speaker 2 (24:52):
In the world.
Speaker 3 (24:53):
And although the other nine and eleven, respectively, were air bags,
they knew that it was a component from the air bag,
but nobody could really prove it prove it, but it
was thought to be so, and that's just kind of
where that stayed. So when the ninth and eleventh one happened,
(25:18):
and I say that respectively, ninth in the nation, eleventh
in the world. When that particular case happened, the corner
sent that person for eyetopesy, had the shrapnel removed, then
went to the junk yard where the car the vehicle
truck was being held, pulled the air bag canister out
(25:42):
of that, drove it, and drove the shrapnel to Duluth, Georgia,
to a lab that specialized in molecular makeup of metals,
kind of like human DNA, right right, took both pieces,
had them studied, had it proven one hundred percent that yes,
(26:05):
the piece of metal that killed the driver, that was
pulled from his neck was indeed the piece of metal
metal that came from the airbag canister that closed it up.
Because there was no denying, there was no speculation from
the other side saying, well you really can't prove it. Well,
(26:28):
it was proven then, and I can speak that language,
and I can speak it well versed, and I know
it like the back of my hand, because that case
was mine, right.
Speaker 1 (26:41):
On that is remarkable.
Speaker 3 (26:46):
Negative things definitely stay with me. Positives due to because
that got put forth to Nitsa, that got put forth
into the entire world, and it forced to Katta to
be accountable. It forced them to look into their product,
(27:09):
to do the proper recalls, to send out the notifications
to everyone that had one of their faulty airbags to
go to the service dealer and have it changed, updated, upgraded,
potentially saving lives.
Speaker 1 (27:27):
Carla, I've never heard that. I'm sitting here just gobsmacked,
So thank you for that. Again. You have no idea
how many lives you saved.
Speaker 3 (27:38):
I don't, And even if it's just one, that's all
I care about. My job is to make sure because
one thing I cannot change, I cannot change death. By
the time my phone rings and my response is required,
(27:59):
that is an eerie event. But what I can change
after that is how we handle the next one, how
we put that information forward, how we put it in
motion to protect health of the future generations. My office
(28:23):
is very advanced as far as the number of autopsies
and toxicology studies that we do, and we do that
because every bit of that data we can collect will
not only help the public, but I also have family
members who are biological and I can say, listen, we
(28:48):
did this study your autopsy. You know, did you know
that your parents had you know this disease or that
when some of them may be dormant, didn't know about
Did you know that there was cardiovascular disease?
Speaker 2 (29:06):
Is it hereditary?
Speaker 3 (29:07):
Is it not?
Speaker 2 (29:07):
I don't know. But what I can tell you is this.
Speaker 3 (29:11):
Here are all of your findings. You are thirty five
years old, take them, Have your family physician, your cardiologist, whomever,
make a copy of this and place it on your chart,
so that your health can start being monitored based on
the history of your loved one and potentially could be
(29:35):
on the radar, and potentially you could have some preventive
measures long before you even have a problem.
Speaker 2 (29:44):
That part of what I do.
Speaker 3 (29:47):
Absolutely love because promoting good health for anyone surrounding these
families and helping them is pretty remarkable in the wake
of an end of life event.
Speaker 1 (30:05):
I told y'all you were going to love her, and
I bet y'all had no idea that that was the
kind of thing she was helping people with.
Speaker 4 (30:17):
How could a beautiful, young first grade teacher be stabbed
twenty times, including in the bat allegedly die of suicide. Yes,
that was the medical examiner's official ruling after a closed
door meeting.
Speaker 1 (30:32):
He first named it a homicide.
Speaker 4 (30:35):
Why what happened to Ellen Greenberg a huge American miscarriage
of justice. For an in depth look at the facts,
see what Happened to Ellen on Amazon. All proceeds to
the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children.
Speaker 1 (30:57):
So listen, let's talk about one last And it's to me,
the worst part of the job, and that's the death
notification I've had to give some I've had the training.
I remember in Atlanta. You know, we're all out there,
me and Leslie all love us, and this poor guy
(31:18):
he didn't want to be there. You could tell he
didn't want to be there. And he was like giving
a scenario. So he said he would knock on the
door and say, are you the wid of Jones? Oh
my gosh, Kay, Kate just bust out with that, you know.
So then he kind of got more comfortable with it,
and you know, they said, look, this is the thing.
(31:40):
You've got to knock on the door, and you've got
to say are you mister or missus? So and so
I regret to inform you you've had a loved one killed.
Like you can't say passed on, you can't so gone beyond,
like You've got to be very clear. They have died,
they have been killed, you know, car wreck whatever. And
(32:00):
he was the first one of us out of that
class that actually got the call and had to give
a death notification. And he said that walking up to
the door, he was just practicing all the steps that
he remembered. You know, are you, miss so and so
I regret to inform you, you know, blah blah. So
(32:20):
we got to the door. He knocked on the door
and he said, or you, missus Smith, and she said yes,
And he said, I regret to inform you your son
was killed in a car accident on Treasure Bridge about
three point thirty this afternoon. And she looked at him
and that was it. He thought, I delivered it perfectly.
I've done everything right. And she said which one? He
(32:46):
had forgotten the victim's name in his panic, in his stress.
You know, it's a horrible thing. I mean, you're walking
to a door knowing you're fixing to destroy somebody's life,
you know, with a four hour training ain't gonna get
you ready for that. So here's what I want to
ask you the death edifications. Do you have a rhythm
(33:10):
of how you do it? And then the last thing
I want you to tie in because I've seen it
and when you talk about yes, the worst thing has happened,
but there is a positive, and Carla, there is always
a positive. Sometimes we got to look mighty hard, but
there is a positive. And I saw it with you
(33:31):
with the bond that you made with Ty's family.
Speaker 2 (33:35):
So I will tell you.
Speaker 3 (33:38):
I'm the training director for the State of South Carolina
Coroners Association, so we have forty six counties and I
am the responsible person for hosting state trainings. They can
get education all kinds of places, but our state ones.
(33:59):
I do that and they have an opportunity to come.
Speaker 2 (34:02):
I tell you that.
Speaker 3 (34:03):
To tell you this, out of several trainings a year,
the one thing that I cannot teach them is how
to make that notification easy.
Speaker 2 (34:17):
I will tell you.
Speaker 3 (34:18):
I am in my twentieth year. I vividly remember the
first time I made a notification and I knocked on
the door. I did it, but I can remember feeling
like it was an out of body experience because it
is not in human nature, it is not in our
(34:41):
comfort zone. I can tell you that was twenty years ago,
and I can tell you that if another county caused
me tonight, or if I have a call and I
go out and I have to do a notification, I
can tell you twenty years ago, I can tell you
(35:02):
how far up in my throat my stomach was, and
I can tell you that tonight my stomach will be
in the same spot in my throat. Because that knock
on the door, that notification never changes ever, and if
(35:26):
it does change, you probably need to seek some professional
help in your days, and these professions are probably done
because if it ever gets to a time that that
is easy for you, you have lost your human compassion
(35:47):
and it's time to back out of that. So I
one hundred percent, wholeheartedly agree with you. My rhythm is this,
I go to the home wherever it is, and I
actually start with that decedent's name because I have that
(36:08):
fear of losing it. So I knock on that door
and I will say when they open the door, I
will say I am looking for relatives of John Day,
and the person answering the door will say I'm his mother, father,
whatever the relationship is. Right, then I go ahead and say,
(36:30):
my name is Carla D's and I am the coroner
from Lancaster County.
Speaker 2 (36:35):
I am here to tell you.
Speaker 3 (36:38):
That your son, or I may call him by name,
I'll either call him by relationship or name. Either one
was involved in a vehicle accident today, and unfortunately he
did not survive. Your son died at whatever time I
use that word, died dead, not passed away, not any
(37:00):
of these soft words. Those have a time and a place, clear,
concise and direct. It does not mean that you don't
have compassion. That compassion comes immediately after that, once they
collect themselves, because that takes a minute. My next words are,
(37:22):
I am here to help you in whatever manner I
can tell me at this moment in time, what I
can do for you, Beautiful, I always when I'm training
my own folks. Here, here's how I want you to relate.
Somebody has just spilled every egg out of their basket.
(37:44):
When you give them that news, your job is to
help them put their eggs back in the basket. Some
of it comes slowly, and you may not get every
egg back in there. Ironically, that is how I knew
the family tie Tai's mother, Chante, had a couple of
(38:07):
deaths in her family over the years. I happened to
be the one to work them. On this particular night,
this particular afternoon, I was giving a heads up that
we had someone who jumped over the bridge and it
was witnessed by multiple drivers a very busy highway, and
I said, oh, gosh, okay, call me if we can
(38:30):
do anything for you guys, because at the time, that's
what you have. You have someone who jumped and they
don't have a sighting on him. Unfortunately, someone in the
mix of emergency response, because the family knew that he
had jumped, because it was witnessed. It was witnessed by
(38:50):
actually some other family members who had just left the
same place he did. Unfortunately, someone said to the family, well,
we think we can we put a camera down there.
We think we see his body. Okay, that's a no no,
because you don't know what you don't know, And they
(39:12):
couldn't say they definitively saw him. They just saw something
in the water. This is murky water. It has all
kinds of stuff in it. It's rolling at ninety three
thousand gallons a second, you know it's impossible. With that
being said, then you have opened the door of the
(39:33):
corner has got to step in. So I go to
the scene, and then I went up on the bridge
and I talked to the family and I realized it
was Shante, his mother, and of course I hugged her in.
I said, listen, I don't know. We don't have a
sighting on a body. However, we are going to look
(39:56):
and give it our all. And that's how I got
a and I stayed involved, and I stayed involved for
nineteen days until we recovered him. And we recovered him
courtesy of our cadaver team and a phenomenal, phenomenal expert
with them, Dave Mylon and Dave organized what we were
(40:21):
doing that morning, and our fire departments got in their
boots and put their crews on them. They put the
dog handlers and the dogs on the boats, and they
executed the plan that Dave laid out perfectly, and within
(40:41):
two and a half hours, not even that much. It
was probably within an hour after our planning and getting
in the boats and them getting all of their directives
from Dave, it was an under an hour we had him.
That's where the horse team was born, and of course
our public unveil for the horse team. Ty had a
(41:02):
child who was born roughly a month after he died,
and that baby was there at the unveiling. So all
of his kids were there, but particularly the baby who
never met his dad, got to be part of what
his dad inspired, and.
Speaker 1 (41:20):
They loved those horses.
Speaker 2 (41:22):
They did well.
Speaker 1 (41:24):
I cannot thank you enough for allowing me to be
a part of your team, and for you being a
part of my Zone seven.
Speaker 3 (41:32):
Well, Cheryl, I cannot thank you enough for thinking of
me and allowing to be part of something so incredible
and so great. The work you do is phenomenal, and
the education you put out there is incredible, and your
work speaks for itself. So to be part of your
(41:55):
Zone seven is just quite an honor. I very much
appreciate it.
Speaker 1 (42:02):
All right, give my buddy a hug, I will, y'all.
I'm gonna end Zone seven the way that I always
do with a quote. And before I do that, I
got to tell you it's kind of funny hearing you
call me Cheryl.
Speaker 3 (42:15):
Well, you know, I didn't want to just call you Mac.
I thought I needed to be proper. But anyway, thanks
happy to be all your jeam.
Speaker 1 (42:24):
It is all good, It's just funny. I'm like, I
don't think I've ever heard her call me that. I'm
going to end Zone seven the way that I always
do with a quote. There are a few who envy me.
They want to know what they have to do to
get my job to be who I am. It's only death,
(42:44):
How hard can it be? They say? Here, I silently reply,
take it all, every fester and remnant of the people
no one cared about in life, much less death, all
the broken children who will never know that I grieved
for them. Take it off. Just leave me my car
(43:07):
key so I can get home permanently. Somebody else can
listen to the bullshit. Death loves dispute. He never shuts up.
Joseph Scott Morgan, Blood Beneath my Feet The journey of
a Southern death investigator. I'm Cheryl McCollum, and this is
(43:30):
own Saven.
Host
Sheryl McCollum
Popular Podcasts
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com