Santa Ana, Calif. — A Southern California jury on Tuesday awarded $1.5 million to the household of a person who was mistakenly declared lifeless by authorities, leading to a stranger being buried within the household plot.
A Superior Courtroom jury discovered the Orange County coroner's workplace dedicated negligence and intentional misrepresentation when it declared Frankie Kerrigan lifeless in 2017.
The workplace mentioned that Kerrigan, who was 57 on the time, had schizophrenia and ceaselessly lived on the streets and had died that Might outdoors a retailer in Fountain Valley.
A police officer informed the coroner's workplace that he believed the physique was Kerrigan's based mostly on earlier contacts and a deputy coroner misidentified him based mostly on Kerrigan's 11-year-old driver's license photograph.
Fingerprints from the lifeless man have been despatched to the FBI and different regulation enforcement businesses and turned out to belong to a different man, John Dean Dickens, 54. Nonetheless, the identification code for the prints wasn't checked because of an worker lack of coaching on a brand new digital system, a coroner's official testified on the trial.
Authorities handed over a physique to the household, who held a Catholic Mass and a burial with an open-casket viewing.
"I touched his hair, and I mentioned goodbye," Kerrigan's father, Francis Kerrigan, testified on the trial in Santa Ana.
However slightly over two weeks after the household was notified of Kerrigan's loss of life, a pal who had been a pallbearer on the funeral referred to as the daddy to say Kerrigan had proven up at his home.
Kerrigan mentioned he was "overjoyed for a couple of minute" earlier than considering: "Oh my God, there is a stranger in Frankie's grave."
The jury awarded $1.1 million to Francis Kerrigan and $400,000 to his daughter, Carole Meikle.
"This can be a wake-up name for the county and each single county on the market," Kerrigan's father mentioned. "It could occur to anyone."
Norm Watkins, who represented the county, mentioned there wasn't any intention to deceive the household and the county will resolve whether or not to enchantment the jury verdict.
Dickens, a Kansas native who died of coronary heart illness, was exhumed from the household gravesite and his physique returned to his relations.
Kerrigan is at the moment dwelling in a lodge and hasn't been informed concerning the verdict, his household mentioned.
James DeSimone, an lawyer who represented Kerrigan and Meikle, mentioned Kerrigan hasn't been taking his medicine however he's "comparatively steady, with a roof over his head."
"If he has some inclination there is a court docket case occurring, they're afraid he'll simply bolt," the lawyer mentioned.
CBS Los Angeles quotes DeSimone as saying, "We're very grateful the jury made this resolution in lower than three hours time so it appears that evidently we did show our case overwhelmingly in court docket and the jury agreed with us.
"The Kerrigan household feels vindicated and grateful that the story was informed and the jury discovered of their favor. They honestly hope the decision does ship a message each to Orange County and different governmental businesses that they should present care and concern with anybody who has a Frankie or anyone mentally in poor health and on the streets. It is best to do your due diligence and do your job by way of speaking with a household, and particularly when it is to allow them to know a member of the family is lifeless."
"They put this household by means of unbelievable trauma," DeSimone added. "They need to have compensated the household 5 years in the past."