Eduardo Lee Hoover, Junior, age 38, sat in his pick-up truck, boxed in by four police cars after a chase in Washington County, PA. One officer shot into the front of the vehicle, trying to disable it. Office Tyler Evans, behind the truck, fatally shot Hoover in the back of the head and neck. Hoover, unarmed and still seated in his pick-up truck, was pronounced dead at the scene on April 2, 2023.
Coroner Inquest at odds with District Attorney’s finding
Washington County District Attorney Jason Walsh declared the shooting justified: “Officers had no choice but to fire their weapons, when Hoover used his truck as a weapon.”
Tim Warco, Washington County’s long-time Coroner, then held an inquest into the shooting. His verdict found Officer Tyler Evans criminally liable for the fatal shooting.
District Attorney Walsh pushed back, stating “I don’t have the time nor the inclination to participate in the coroner’s theatrical nonsense.” He then raided the offices of Coroner Warco and Warco’s solicitor to confiscate evidence reviewed during the inquest. As tensions between the two elected officials escalated, a judge issued a stay (pause) order. The case is currently pending further investigation.
Limited revival of inquests in Pennsylvania
According to Pennsylvania’s current Coroner Statute (16 Pa. Stat. § 1219-B), an inquest has three purposes:
- Ascertain the cause of death
- Determine whether an individual other than the deceased was criminally responsible by act or neglect and the identity of the individual who may be responsible
- Examine further evidence and witnesses regarding the cause of death
Coroners in at least three Pennsylvania counties—Westmoreland, Fayette, Chester—have proposed or conducted inquests into deaths in custody. The Washington County District Attorney was unusually strenuous and public in his opposition to the Coroner’s legally conducted proceedings. Perceived or behind-the-scenes pressure from their district attorneys or commissioners may be inhibiting the greater use of coroner inquests, especially in cases of a death in custody.
Coroner inquests: medieval or modern?
Inquests originated in the early Middle Ages in England—just like the rest of the common law system in the United States. Coroner inquests in America slowly faded away in the late twentieth century. Some still voice the opinion that coroners’ inquests are outdated, superseded by modern science and forensic investigations.
Nevertheless, to paraphrase Mark Twain, rumors of the death of the inquest have been greatly exaggerated. Inquest statutes remain on the books in most states, ready to be being dusted off in the interests of transparency around deaths in custody. To that end, legal scholars like Paul MacMahon are reexamining the role of the inquest in our justice system.
What is soft adjudication?
In 2015, Paul MacMahon published an article in the Yale Law & Policy Review titled “The Inquest and the Virtues of Soft Adjudication.” In it he describes the inquest as “a legal institution designed especially for difficult death adjudications. The inquest is a quasi-judicial proceeding whose purpose is to decide how a person died.”
In his conclusion, MacMahon favors the revival of coroner inquests, recommending that “American localities adopt a practice of holding automatic inquests every time a person dies at the hands of the state.”
Why do we need inquests?
Roger A. Mitchell Jr, co-author with Jay D. Aronson of Death in Custody: How America Ignores the Truth and What We Can Do About It, calls deaths in custody “a public health emergency.” Lack of transparency around such deaths means the public no longer trusts law enforcement to police its own. As in the Eduardo Lee Hoover Jr case, law enforcement almost always finds police shootings justified. Turnover of wrongful convictions has further eroded confidence in the criminal justice system.
But George Floyd’s murder in 2020 has been the primary catalyst for the revival of inquests in places like Los Angeles.
Deaths in custody spur revival of coroner inquests in Los Angeles
As in Pennsylvania, inquests in California had almost disappeared. Then, almost ten years ago, LA Times reporter Doug Smith asked whether inquests might provide answers in police shootings. But it wasn’t until 2020 that Los Angeles took action.
On September 1, 2020, the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors approved a motion directing the Chief Medical Examiner-Coroner to “conduct an inquest into the circumstance, manner, and cause of the death of Mr. Andres Guardado.”
The Board stated that “In the wake of the murder of George Floyd, and far too many others since then, demands for accountability of law enforcement have escalated. The disturbing trend within law enforcement to thwart oversight and transparency of internal investigations threatens to further erode the public’s trust that justice will be served.”
The LA Medical Examiner/Coroner office has since conducted at least five inquests into police shootings, each open to the public.
When the Sheriff is the Coroner: Montana’s inquest law
Montana requires inquests in prison deaths and police shootings. But Montana’s inquest process has been criticized because sheriffs are often also the coroner. On top of that, all inquests in recent times have found police shootings “justified.” In a Cascade County inquest on prison deaths in August 2021, “A jury took only minutes in each case to return decisions that the deaths were not by criminal means.”
Until 2024, the law specified that “civilian coroners” (e.g. not sheriffs) had to be the hearing officers at inquests. Most of Montana’s counties, however, combine the two offices leading to a shortage of civilian coroners and delayed inquests. In response, the state passed a law in 2023 allowing sheriff-coroners to officiate at inquests. County attorneys play an active role, raising the question of conflict of interest in case of deaths in a county prison or at the hands of county employees. A jury, however, must be convened and ultimately renders a verdict.
Transparency in death investigation
This quick look at the revival of coroner inquests in three states in America shows some promising developments, but there’s a long way to go. More coroners should exercise their legal power to bring much-needed transparency to death investigation.
Readers: Send me an email if you have experience with an inquest in your county, whether for a death in custody or any other type of death investigation.