SJC upholds firing of medical examiner after misplaced body case

July 9, 2008 01:24 PM Email| Comments (0)| Text size – +

By Jonathan Saltzman, Globe Staff

Governor Deval Patrick had the authority to fire Dr. Mark A. Flomenbaum as Massachusetts' chief medical examiner last August after Flomenbaum's office misplaced a body in a macabre episode, the state's highest court ruled today.

The Supreme Judicial Court ruled unanimously that Patrick's firing of Flomenbaum was "not arbitrary or capricious'' and rejected the forensic pathologist's assertion that his dismissal breached a five-year contract he had signed with Governor Mitt Romney in Jaunary 2005.

"The evidence before the Governor sufficiently supports his determination that there were serious problems concerning the performance of the plaintiff's administrative and managerial duties," Justice John M. Greaney wrote on behalf of the court.

Patrick sacked Flomenbaum after his office in late April misplaced the body of a Cape Cod man that State Police later found buried in another man's grave. Around the time of the firing, a consulting firm hired by the state said Flomenbaum's office was on the "verge of collapse" from extreme mismanagement.

The high court noted that the Globe had reported on March 15 last year that bodies overflowed the storage areas at the medical examiner's office and were being stacked in refrigerator trucks parked outside the building. The trucks were ordinarily reserved for holding disaster victims.

Flomenbaum and his lawyer, Thomas R. Kiley, were not immediately available for comment.

Terrel Harris, a spokesman for the Executive Office of Public Safety and Security, which oversees the medical examiner's office, was pleased by the ruling.

"All we can really say is that we believe the decision was appropriate," he said. "The court affirmed the governor's belief and his authority."

The office is currently headed by an acting medical examiner, Dr. Henry Nields.