Estate of Severt v. Wood, 95-CA-40

• Citation: 667 N.E.2d 1250,107 Ohio App.3d 123
• Decision Date: 25 October 1995
• Docket Number: No. 95-CA-40,95-CA-40
• Parties: ESTATE OF SEVERT et al., Appellee, v. WOOD, Coroner, et al., Appellants.
• Court: United States Court of Appeals (Ohio)

Page 123

107 Ohio App.3d 123

667 N.E.2d 1250

ESTATE OF SEVERT et al., Appellee, v. WOOD, Coroner, et al., Appellants.

No. 95-CA-40.

Court of Appeals of Ohio Second District, Clark County.

Decided Oct. 25, 1995.

Ronald C. Parsons, West Jefferson, for appellee.

William D. Hoffman, Clark County Assistant Prosecuting Attorney, Springfield, for appellants.

FREDERICK N. YOUNG, Judge.

Clark County Coroner Dirk G. Wood appeals from the trial court's declaratory judgment ordering him to amend Joy Sue Severt's death certificate to show her cause of death as "undetermined" rather than "suicide."

Wood advances two assignments of error. First, he contends the trial court erred in not finding R.C. 313.19 void for vagueness. Second, he asserts the trial court erred in applying a "preponderance of the evidence" standard when reviewing his opinion concerning Joy Severt's cause of death. He also argues that even under the preponderance standard, the trial court should have sustained his medical opinion.

Wood's appeal stems from Joy Severt's death by a gunshot wound in the early morning hours of February 5, 1993. Shortly before her death, Joy Severt, who was home alone, telephoned her daughter, Tammy Severt, and stated that someone outside Joy Severt's home was banging on the windows. Tammy Severt arrived at her mother's residence approximately five minutes later and, finding neither her mother nor an intruder, called 911 from inside her mother's home.

Shortly thereafter, law enforcement officials arrived at Joy Severt's home and discovered her lying face down in the back yard with an apparent bullet hole in her chest. Officers also discovered a .45 caliber revolver lying beneath her body. A subsequent autopsy confirmed a close range gunshot wound to Joy Severt's chest. Toxicology reports also signaled the presence of the drug benzodiapines in Joy Severt's system.

Based upon his own investigation, the investigation of the Clark County Sheriff's Department, the autopsy report, and the toxicology results, Wood certified Joy Severt's cause of death as "suicide" on February 8, 1993. Approximately six weeks later, Edmund Severt initiated the present action as executor of Joy Severt's estate. Pursuant to R.C. 313.19, he sought an order from the common pleas court directing Wood to change Joy Severt's cause of death from "suicide" to "undetermined."

Wood filed a motion to dismiss Edmund Severt's complaint on April 16, 1993, arguing that R.C. 313.19 is unconstitutional. The trial court subsequently overruled this motion and issued a decision ordering Wood to amend Joy Severt's death certificate to list her cause of death as "undetermined." Wood subsequently filed this timely appeal.

I

In his first assignment of error, Wood contends the trial court erred when it overruled his motion to dismiss Edmund Severt's complaint brought pursuant to R.C. 313.19. Specifically, Wood claims that R.C. 313.19, which permits a court of common pleas to direct a coroner to change his decision regarding a decedent's cause of death, is constitutionally void for vagueness.

We begin our analysis with a review of R.C. 313.19, which provides:

"The cause of death and manner and mode in which the death occurred, as delivered by the coroner and incorporated in the coroner's verdict and in the death certificate filed with the division of vital statistics, shall be the legally accepted manner and mode in which such death occurred, and the legally accepted cause of death, unless the court of common pleas of the county in which the death occurred, after a hearing, directs the coroner to change his decision as to such cause and manner and mode of death."

In Vargo v. Travelers Ins. Co. (1987), 34 Ohio St.3d 27, 516 N.E.2d 226, the Ohio Supreme Court construed R.C. 313.19 and ruled that a coroner's decision " 'is entitled to much weight.' " Id. at 30, 516 N.E.2d at 229 (quoting State v. Manago [1974], 38 Ohio St.2d 223, 227, 67 O.O.2d 291, 293, 313 N.E.2d 10, 13). The court then held that "the coroner's factual determinations concerning the manner, mode and cause of the decedent's death, as expressed in the coroner's report and death certificate, create a non-binding, rebuttable presumption concerning such facts in the absence of competent, credible evidence to the contrary." Vargo at 30, 516 N.E.2d at 229.

The Vargo court also explained in dicta that pursuant to R.C. Chapter 2721, commonly known as the Declaratory Judgments Act, a court of common pleas has jurisdiction to resolve factual questions arising in an R.C. 313.19 action. Id. at 29-30, 516 N.E.2d at 229, fn. 3. The Ohio Supreme Court reaffirmed its Vargo dicta six years later in Perez v. Cleveland (1993), 66 Ohio St.3d 397, 613 N.E.2d 199, when it again interpreted R.C. 313.19 and concluded that a declaratory judgment action is the proper means for a plaintiff to challenge a coroner's findings. Id. at 399, 613 N.E.2d at 200-201. Finally, last year in State ex rel. Blair v. Balraj (1994), 69 Ohio St.3d 310, 631 N.E.2d 1044, the court cited its earlier Vargo and Perez decisions and noted that "an action for declaratory judgment in the court of common pleas [was] the way to implement R.C. 313.19's hearing provisions in a case where plaintiff sought to have the coroner's verdict changed from 'homicide' to 'natural causes.' " Id. at 314, 631 N.E.2d at 1048.

Wood stresses, however, that three Ohio appellate decisions have declared R.C. 313.19 void for vagueness, and he challenges the provision's constitutional validity. The Ohio Supreme Court acknowledged these appellate decisions in Perez but declined to address R.C. 313.19's constitutionality because the issue was not properly before the court. Perez, supra, 66 Ohio St.3d at 398, 613 N.E.2d at 200.

In support of his argument that R.C. 313.19 is constitutionally infirm, Wood cites State ex rel. Dana v. Gerber (1946), 79 Ohio App. 1, 34 O.O. 48, 70 N.E.2d 111, Roark v. Lyle (App.1953), 52 O.O. 168, 121 N.E.2d 837, and Goldsby v. Gerber (1987), 31 Ohio App.3d 268, 31 OBR 553, 511 N.E.2d 417. In Dana, the Cuyahoga County Court of Appeals articulated the crux of Wood's argument, holding that G.C. 2855-16 (now R.C. 313.19) "attempts to vest the Court of Common Pleas with jurisdiction to review the findings of the coroner but does not provide the method or means by which such jurisdiction shall be invoked or exercised, and does not provide some mode or method which will guarantee the parties their constitutional rights to have their day in court and is inoperative and void for uncertainty and indefiniteness." Dana, supra, at syllabus.

The Hamilton County Court of Appeals adopted Dana 's reasoning and conclusions in a one-sentence per curiam opinion in 1952. Roark, supra, 52 O.O. at 168, 121 N.E.2d at 837. Similarly, in Goldsby the Cuyahoga County Court of Appeals cited approvingly to its earlier Dana ruling and noted: "This court long ago held that the judicial review provision in R.C. 313.19 is constitutionally void for vagueness. The purported judicial review language fails to define the method or means by which the court's jurisdiction can be invoked or exercised. Nothing explains who can initiate review, when it can be initiated, how it can be initiated, or what standard the court uses for that review." (Citations omitted.) Goldsby, supra, 31 Ohio App.3d at 270, 31 OBR at 555, 511 N.E.2d at 420.

Wood urges this court to adopt the reasoning first articulated in Dana and later followed in Roark and Goldsby. However, we respectfully disagree with the contention that R.C. 313.19 is unconstitutionally void for vagueness. In so doing, we rely upon the Ohio Supreme Court's repeated pronouncements, discussed supra, that an action for a declaratory judgment in the court of common pleas is the proper means to implement R.C. 313.19 and challenge a coroner's findings. Although the court has not definitively addressed whether R.C. 313.19 is void for vagueness, its ruling that a declaratory judgment action is the proper vehicle to challenge a coroner's conclusions resolves much of R.C. 313.19's ambiguity.

We recognize, as Wood stresses, that R.C. 313.19 does not delineate the method or means by which the common pleas court's jurisdiction can be invoked. Nor does the statute explain who can initiate review, when it can be initiated, or what standard the court should apply when conducting that review. However, we believe the Ohio Supreme Court's Vargo, Perez, and Blair decisions provide significant guidance.

As noted above, the Ohio Supreme Court identified an action for declaratory judgment as the proper means of invoking R.C. 313.19's hearing provision. See Vargo, supra, 34 Ohio St.3d at 29-30, 516 N.E.2d at 229, fn. 3 (noting that under R.C. Chapter 2721, the Declaratory Judgments Act, the common pleas court "has jurisdiction to both hear and determine the type of factual questions raised in an R.C. 313.19 action."); Blair, supra, 69 Ohio St.3d at 314, 631 N.E.2d at 1047-1048 (identifying a declaratory judgment as the proper method to challenge a coroner's findings pursuant to R.C. 313.19). Consequently, we cannot agree that the statute is unconstitutionally vague because it fails to identify the method or means by which the common pleas court's jurisdiction can be invoked.

Similarly, we reject Wood's assertion that R.C. 313.19 is unconstitutionally vague because it fails to identify who may initiate a review of the coroner's conclusions. Having determined that a declaratory judgment action is the proper mechanism to invoke R.C. 313.19, Ohio case law defines who may initiate such a review. In Schaefer v. First Natl. Bank (1938), 134 Ohio St. 511, 13 O.O. 129, 18 N.E.2d 263, the Ohio Supreme Court declared that a plaintiff must present a "real and substantial controversy" to be afforded relief through the special remedy of a declaratory judgment. Id. at paragraph three of the syllabus. Moreover, resolution of that controversy must confer certain...