KENT COUNTY MEDICAL EXAMINER COMPROMISED

Over the past few months, we have received information from three different local families that reveal a conflict of interest involving the Chief Medical Examiner of Kent County, Dr. Stephen D. Cohle.  You may have heard of the name.  Cohle is a bit of media hound.  Last year the Grand Rapids Press ran a feature story on the man in which the good doctor bragged about the emotional boost his new Porsche gave him after his recent divorce.  Unfortunately, the issue at hand is not the trivial matter of Cohle’s personal priorities.

Each family has reported to us a similar story:  A close relative died while in the care of a Spectrum Health Corporation facility under suspicious circumstances.  The grieving family ordered a private independent autopsy from Laboratory Pathologists P.C. for $2,500.  The findings of the autopsy from Laboratory Pathologists exonerated Spectrum Health of any wrongdoing.  However, upon closer examination the autopsy was incomplete and failed to meet professional standards.

Come to find out, Laboratory Pathologists is not independent at all.  It has a big contract with Spectrum Health to provide its network with pathology services.  Moreover, nine of the thirteen physicians who own Laboratory Pathologists are on the staff of Spectrum Health.  In fact, one of the owners is a Spectrum Health medical director and two others are associate medical directors.  Obviously, Laboratory Pathologists know which side of its bread is buttered, and it isn’t the side providing purportedly independent autopsies to the families.

Of course, the families cheated by Laboratory Pathologists have recourse to the government right?  The Kent County medical examiner can and should investigate suspicious deaths, right?  You would think so, but think again when the county’s chief medical examiner is an owner and an officer of Laboratory Pathologists.  That’s right, folks.  Cohle, our chief medical examiner, owns and operates Laboratory Pathologists.  In fact, Cohle provides his services to Kent County through Laboratory Pathologists.  So, the chief medical examiner, unlike the chief prosecutor or the police chief or the fire chief, is not full-time government official but a part-time private freelancer.  The bottom line is that Cohle earns a substantial portion of his income from Spectrum Health, so he cannot make any disinterested judgment as to whether or not a death in a Spectrum Health facility is suspicious and merits the attention of the county’s medical examiner office.

The Kent County Board of Commissioners is well aware of this conflict of interest.  They have been advised of the actual problems that have arisen from this conflict and the distress it has caused at least three local families.  Yet they have done nothing about it.  This conflict is unacceptable.  We would not put up with a county prosecutor who was also a partner in a law firm providing criminal defense services.  Why is it OK to have a medical examiner who is a hireling of the local healthcare behemoth where legitimate questions routinely arise as to its culpability for deaths occurring in its facilities?  It’s not.  We are entitled to have all of our principal public safety officers serve as disinterested public servants whose judgments are not compromised by private business deals.

Give your support to these local families who got no justice from Cohle and his company.  Demand that the Kent County Board of Commissioners hire a chief medical examiner who works only for us.

NOTE:  Also read about other developments, how Spectrum cowed the reporting of WXYZ-TV news and how the City of Grand Rapids erased the record of this issue from the City Commission minutes, here and here.

Comments

[Brian]

I find your comments interesting, especially since you yourself have almost certainly never met Dr. Cohle, or carried on anything resembling an informed conversation with him. Well, I have. In fact, I worked alongside of him for a few months, and would have to consider the information that I picked up during that time to be significately more accurate and informed than the second hand "information" that you have pawned off to the public. I do not deny that Dr. Cohle has other positions besides Chief Medical Examiner, but then again, who doesn't have more than one face. I'm sure that all this website is not all that you do.

You may believe that Dr. Cohle is a conniving, scheming man with a secret and vile agenda, but I have worked alongside of him, and in all the time that I have spent with him, the only thing that he has ever done is to find the truth in the patients that he has autopsied, and in doing so, has provided peace of mind to hundreds, if not thousands of families. And, for the record, Dr. Cohle covers for no one. He speaks the truth, even when it isn't popular.

So, instead of slinging mud on an admirable man, check into the ulterior motives of the families who have complained. After all, it's not hard to lose a loved one, but it's easy to assign blame where it doesn't belong. And that's the truth.

[The Executive Director]

Brian,

I don't know what to make of someone who doesn't think it's hard to lose a love one. Especially someone who is ready to impugn the motives of those who suffered the loss without any specific statement about why we shouldn't take their grievances against Cohle seriously.

In any event, you miss something important. As a public official Cohle does not have the luxury of holding multiple positions that put him in a conflict of interest with his solemn duty to the public. Having Cohle determine as matter of public record whether or not the work of his private firm passes muster is unacceptable. It violates the public trust, especially when that determination is thoroughly flawed by professional standards.

Just as we would not tolerate a chief of police investigating the conduct of a detective agency he owns, we do not have to tolerate Cohle's conflict of interest. It is grotesque that the families who lost loved ones under suspect circumstances which Cohle's private associates may or may not have covered up have been made to justify their suspicion of Cohle, when Cohle by any measure of public duty is the one who must justify his conflict of interest.

That Cohle is a media-hound and a charmer is no substitute for the facts. I hold him accountable for his conflict of interest even if those we elected to do so will not.

Regards,
Bill Tingley
Executive Director

[Brian]

I apologize for miswriting the statement, "It's not hard to lose a loved one." What I meant to say was "It's hard to lose a loved one, but easy..."

Obviously this damaged my credibility, and for that, I apologize.

[The Executive Director]

Hi, Brian.

That's good to know. It seemed to be such a harsh thing to say, but as you know many people do make statements like that in forums like these. Nevertheless, on second thought I should've considered that you made a typo.

Regards, Bill

[Families United for Justice]

To Bill Tingley and all LAW Readers,

Despite all the factual evidence that our families have submitted to the City, the County and the State about Dr. Stephen Cohle and the Kent County Medical Examiner's office, the Kent County Board of Commissioners will be voting to renew the county's contract with Dr. Cohle and his for-profit pathology company, Michigan Pathology Specialists, at its meeting on December 14th. Keep in mind that this is just one of several for-profit companies that Dr. Cohle owns and operates, which totally conflicts with his county medical examiner role as "public servant". The Kent County Board of Commissioners will also be voting on a big pay raise for Dr. Cohle as well. We thought LAW and interested readers would like to know how the County Commissioners continue to condone and help cover up what they all know is really going on at the Kent County Medical Examiner's Office. Dr. Cohle and his for-profit companies are cheating our families out of the truth about what really happened to our loved ones, and this is wrong.

[Families United for Justice]

Our families wanted to let L.A.W. know that two Kent County Commissioners (Dick Bulkowski and Paul Mayhue) voted no last week on the Kent County Medical Examiner's new contract and big pay increase. At least these two commissioners questioned this matter on behalf of the taxpayers.

What's also interesting to note is that the County Board has now started removing all references to Spectrum Health and Laboratory Pathologists, P.C. from the medical examiner contract language, all County Board sub-committee meeting minutes, etc.

In addition, Kent County administrators continue to reference numerous in-house investigations that have supposedly been conducted into the many valid complaints that have been voiced about Dr. Stephen Cohle and his activities as Chief Medical Examiner during public meetings. Yet, the families that have voiced these complaints have never been able to get any information about these so-called "in-house" investigations, nor why Dr. Stephen Cohle and his for-profit company would be allowed to quote autopsy fees that range from $2,500 to $10,000, depending on what family was asking. Maybe more of our Kent County Commissioners should start asking questions about what's really going on at the Medical Examiner's Office - instead of just laughing off our concerns.

[Paul Vaughan]

First of all, if one of your loved ones or friends has recently passed I extend my condolences. However, I find your comments to be incomplete without insight into the valuable services that Dr. Cohle provides. I am tired about hearing allegations of conflict of interest without supporting information. It is one thing to say someone lied or cheated and it is another thing to say they could. The resources available in certain areas of specialties are just so limited. I have worked with Dr. Cohle in the past and have attended seminars he has instructed. He is an individual of character and expertise. He tells the truth, good or bad. I am sorry that some people feel they may have been cheated because they disagreed with his finding but to call it a conflict of interest is a reach. His interest is in finding the cause and manner of death, not clearing or blaming someone.

Come up with facts not something that he could do. There is a small community of qualified experts in his field, he is one of the best and he would never taint his opinion for Spectrum Health, he has too much at risk to do such a thing.

You owe him an apology.

[The Executive Director]

Mr. Vaughan,

Thank you for your comments.

Doing shoddy work that obscures the "cause and manner of death" that might implicate in wrongdoing a private business client of the county's medical examiner is a serious issue. You offer no facts or argument defending Cohle's findings in the cases we covered here other than to say you don't think Cohle is the sort of guy to be compromised by a conflict of interest.

The fact is Cohle did a lousy job in these cases. As it happens that lousy work benefited Spectrum Health, who is Cohle's biggest client of his private business. Just as we don't need a county prosecutor compromised by doing criminal defense work on the side and don't need a sheriff doing P.I. work on the side, we don't need a medical examiner providing pathology services on the side.

The people of Kent County deserve better of their public officials, especially those who function as part of the judical system. The loyalty of the medical examiner should be to his public office and no one else, especially not private business clients.

Regards,
Bill Tingley
Executive Director

[Bridget - The Editor]

Dear Mr. Vaughan...

I have been in the medical field for many years, laboratory technology to be exact.

During my years of education and hands on training, I have performed disections on human cadavers. I have performed an untold number of specimen collection and laboratory analysis as well. And as expected, I have executed hundreds to thousands of lab reports with the final analysis to doctors, nurses and fellow technicians. My professional credentials with the A.S.C.P. would allow me no less than complete competency and accuracy in my field.

One thing that is critical in the field of medicine - any field of medicine including The Medical Examiners office - is ACCURACY. That goes from the time you identify the patient (alive or deceased - and yes, that includes something as simple as getting the persons first, middle and last name right), to retrieving the specimens, labeling collection containers, analyzing a sample and eventually reporting out the final data. A medical professional's opinion of disease and death is only as good as what they investigate and report. It all begins with accuracy.

There is NO EXCUSE for the number of errors and mistakes that was seen and evaluated in the Jennings and Sallie cases. These errors and mistakes are not about being upset over the loss of a loved one. These are errors and mistakes that should not have occurred. The lack of attention to accuracy and detail in these cases by Dr. Cohle create additional pain and difficulty for these families when they are trying to come to grips with the death of a loved one AND if that loved one should have even died at all.

No doctor of good standing, no county medical examiner would call themselves top notch with the number of errors found in the evaluation, analysis and final reporting data that was done on these two cases involving Dr. Cohle and Spectrum Health.

We have posted the inaccuracies known to date. The evidence has been shockingly incomplete (missing body parts), inaccurate (wrong name of the deceased, incorrectly described body parts and disease state of the deceased) and missing evidence (medical charts and histories that could not be found, pages to evaluations and lab reports no longer accessible, documents that refused to be released even with power of attorney & legal intervention and so on) and even questionnable signatures and dates on paperwork along the way.

To be quite honest, if there was nothing amiss in these cases, I feel strongly Dr. Cohle and Spectrum would have handled these concerns quickly and early in the process. They should have opened the doors of communication and paperwork to these families to clear their minds and suspicions. Their lack of assistance, incomplete body of work and errors would make any family feel a sense of unease.
In turn, the way these families have been treated by Dr. Cohle and Spectrum is nothing short of appalling. Dr. Cohle and the hospital administrators seemed to care more for keeping good P.R. in place than actually addressing all the errors on this case. They preferred to label the grieving families as close to crazy and looney as possible to make themselves look good, when in fact the evidence suggests the doctor and the administrators are the ones at fault.

Bill addressed above another critical component to this case involving conflict of interest. One cannot service two masters at one time. It is nearly impossible for one to be an impartial evaluator of medical evidence (possibly a mysterious or questionnable death) by one party and then be paid by the same person you are evaluating. Call us skeptical, but the person evaluating the evidence should not be tied to the person who needs the evidence to be clean. Dr. Cohle may be a good teacher, writer or presenter. We are not concerned with that. We are concerned with his relationship as a provider to Spectrum and his service to the people of this county as Medical Examiner. He is servicing two masters here and frankly it is wrong and public needs to be made aware of it.

Until mistakes are corrected, information shared and the county M.E. not affiliated with any public or private medical institution - problems such as the Jennings and Sallie families have encountered will continue. There is no way any family in West Michigan will ever get a fair and accurate autopsy report on their loved one if a questionnable death occurs when the M.E., the hospitals and medical facilities are all in bed with one another. Conflicts of interest and poor work ethics such as we have seen by Dr. Cohle and Spectrum should rightly worry the public at large.

We will continue to call out this issue until these problems are corrected for the good of all citizens in this region.

[Dan]

HELP? does anyone know of past opinion's of Dr. Stephen D. Cohle that were wrong? any cases where he ruled one way and then was determined wrong? any cases where he judge his findings on his gut feeling instead of medical or physical proof? please let me know as he has made a mistake in my son's death. thank you

[Bridget - The Editor L.A.W.]

Hello Dan,

You should try contacting Phyllis Jennings at Families United for Justice. We have a link to her website in the left hand menu at The Local Area Watch.

The loss of your son is tragic and you clearly could use some help in resolving questions you have regarding the medical work done on your son's behalf by Dr. Cohle. Phyllis may be able to help guide you as her family experienced problems with Dr. Cohle in years past. She will be very interested in the experience you had with this practionier. Even if she can't help you beyond some general assistance, she may be able to give you some avenues outside of her foundation who can help you further.

Good luck and may your family find peace in time.

Regards,

[Bridget - Editor, L.A.W.]

Brief Update to L.A.W. Readers;

Phyllis Jennings is no longer an activist in the local community with Families United For Justice. She has taken a break from her duties. We do not know if/when her organization will re-open again.

We appreciate her earlier assistance and feedback on important local issues and wish her the best.

Any concerns local citizens may have over Dr. Cohle or Spectrum Health should be directed to the state and the county.

Regards,

[Richard]

OMG - you mean a man who has spent countless hours for the past 20 + years trying to give families closure has been lying all along???? Give me a break. Get a life.

[The Executive Director]

Richard,

Apparently you don't get what the primary duty of a medical examiner is. It is the pursuit of the truth, specifically ascertaining the facts of a person's death.

Sweeping a death under the rug because it might implicate your paymaster may bring closure, but it doesn't get you the truth.

Speaking of the truth, you may find you will encounter it more often by not uncritically regurgitating the talking points of a shameless self-promoter.

Regards,
Bill Tingley
Executive Director, L.A.W.

[The Executive Director]

FYI, readers.

"Richard" has also posted comments elsewhere critical of our reporting on Medical Examiner Cohle's conflict of interest under the moniker "c.o.d."

So this mini-groundswell of support for Cohle isn't quite what it seems.

Your executive director,
Bill Tingley

[A.G.]

In his role as the Kent County Chief Medical Examiner, Dr. Stephen Cohle is supposed to report to the people of Kent County - not to Spectrum Health and their attorneys. A county medical examiner cannot serve two masters at the same time (as Bill has stated before).

[C.o.d]

Thats ok guys - keep shooting from the hip - it just makes you look and sound more and more less informed. So go "shill" for controversy elsewhere.