PIERCE COUNTY, Wash. — Another complaint has been leveled against the Pierce County Medical Examiner's Office and the way it conducts organ donation efforts.
This time, a widow claims there's a conflict of interest and an imbalance when it comes to recovering organs and respecting the wishes of grieving families.
Barbara Leander is asking that the county executive make big changes within the medical examiner’s office because of how she was treated hours after making a horrific discovery.
“It just brought everything right back, especially that phone call," said Leander.
That call came at 2 a.m., 12 hours after Leander found her husband, Tom, dead in their back yard in December, 2014.
He had committed suicide.
She says the call was from a woman identifying herself as “with the Pierce County Medical Examiner's Office.”
Leander says the woman asked her several questions related to whether she would allow her husband’s eyes to be donated.
“I was quite hysterical and I asked if they could call at another time and they said no they couldn't that time was of essence," said Leander.
She said she was asked if her husband had recently traveled, if he had engaged in homosexual activity.
“When you’re in the shock of discovering a suicide, it’s certainly not the time to ask somebody questions,” she said. “Especially not at two o’clock in the morning.”
The call was from SightLife, an organization the ME’s office partners with for organ donations, including corneas.
A spokeswoman for the county says the medical examiner is required by law to partner with tissue recovery organizations.
Leander says the caller's disregard for her grief raised concerns after she learned of the whistleblower complaint recently filed against M.E. Tom Clark that accuses him of pushing staff to get as many organ donations as possible and pushing families to donate.
Lead investigator Melissa Baker alleges Clark allows organ donation organizations to examine bodies while they’re still in the morgue.
“They have unrestricted access to bodies,” she told KIRO 7 in an earlier interview. “They can go down and access bodies, property, homicide victims.”
"It's more of a harvesting than a donation,” said Leander. “It's like, wait a minute, this just too convenient."
Leander and attorney Joan Mell want Clark replaced.
They want “a different M.E. who will implement a policy that is sensitive to the needs of families and people grieving death,” said Mell. “The immediacy needs to be balanced against the preservation of the corneas or any other transplant organ.”
They also want a new policy on when to call grieving families, especially in suicides.
KIRO 7 News called SightLife on Tuesday.
A spokeswoman said it’s an “unfortunate reality” that coordinators have to call all families at all hours of the day or night.
That’s because they have a window of 12 to 24 hours to recover tissue or organs.
When it comes to corneas, SightLife says if eyes are recovered 12 hours after death, there’s a good chance they could restore someone’s sight.
Leander was told her husband committed suicide at around 10 that morning.
And they point to the success of their efforts, reporting: Pierce County donors provided sight to more than 1,100 people in 2015.
About a third of the corneas came directly from the partnership with the medical examiner’s office.
Leander, a donor herself, understands the effort and importance.
But she doesn’t like the way it was done.
"Where the survivor is saying I can't talk repeatedly, let them go, call them back in an hour, and if you can't donate those [organs] you can't," she said.
We asked SightLife if anything will change in their approach, and they said they always look for feedback and welcome Leander calling them directly.
Coordinators commonly identify themselves as working within an association such as a medical examiner’s office.
As for the relationship between the M.E.’s office and SightLife, SightLife spokeswoman Sherry Anderson says it’s not an unusual partnership; adding “we are really proud of the partnership.”
Leander is weighing her legal options, but says she wants changes made.
“I’m here hopefully to facilitate a change to prevent others who go through the trauma of losing a loved one to not go through what I’ve gone through.”