DOJ takes action after Mississippi coroner buried men without families’ knowledge
This article is part of “Lost Rites,” a https://www.nbcnews.com/lost-rites on America’s failed death notification system.
The Justice Department said Thursday it would help authorities in Mississippi improve their death notification procedures, an attempt to correct systemic failures uncovered by NBC News that resulted in people being buried in a pauper’s field without their families knowing.
“Families want and deserve transparency and the opportunity to make decisions about their loved ones’ burials,” Assistant Attorney General Kristen Clarke, who leads the Justice Department’s civil rights division, said in a statement. “Through technical assistance, we aim to ensure that officials are able to deliver death notifications and make decisions regarding burials in a timely and trauma-informed way that complies with federal civil rights law.”
The Justice Department said it will focus on helping the Jackson Police Department and Hinds County coroner’s office.
The move is a response to NBC News’ reporting on the failed notifications, which began last year with the story of Dexter Wade, who was struck and killed by an off-duty police officer in Jackson without anyone telling his mother, even after she reported him missing. After his body went unclaimed for months, the Hinds County coroner’s office had Wade buried in a pauper’s field on the grounds of the county jail work farm, his grave marked only by a number. Wade’s mother, Bettersten Wade, didn’t find out until August, five months after her son’s death.
