Delaware governor poised to bar public access to autopsy photos

By The Associated Press

05.08.02

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DOVER, Del. — The state House yesterday approved and sent to the governor a bill prohibiting media and public access to autopsy photographs.

The bill, pushed by the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner, was approved by a vote of 39-2. It was approved 17-2 last month in the Senate, where supporters said the privacy of the dead and their families outweighs the public's right to know.

Gov. Ruth Ann Minner supports the bill and will sign it into law, said spokesman Greg Patterson.

"It protects the family members of (dead) people from further anguish," he said.

The bill adds photographs and audio and visual recordings from post-mortem examinations to the list of records exempt from the state's Freedom of Information law. Anyone wishing to examine autopsy photos would have to obtain a court subpoena.

Under questioning by lawmakers, Gerry Spadaccini, deputy principal assistant in the chief medical examiner's office, said state officials believe autopsy photos already are exempt from the Freedom of Information Act and would not be released now except under court order.

"We believe that it's covered anyway," Spadaccini said. "This just makes it more specific."

Spadaccini also reiterated that his office had not received a single request for autopsy photos in the three years he's worked there.

"I was not convinced the witness felt there was a need for the bill," said state Rep. Richard DiLiberto Jr., D-Newark East, one of only two lawmakers to vote against the bill.

"I just don't like whittling down the Freedom of Information Act," DiLiberto said. "I think anytime you take away the public's right to know about what their government is doing, there has to be a severe urgency for that."

The legislation is based on a similar bill passed last year in Florida after NASCAR driver Dale Earnhardt was killed in a crash at the Daytona 500. Lawmakers there made it illegal for the public to access autopsy photos without a court's permission.

A Florida circuit judge hearing arguments in a media challenge to the Florida law said in March that the state's open-records statute may override a family's wishes in barring the release of such photos.

Patterson said several NASCAR fans have called Minner's office in support of the Delaware legislation.

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