LOS ANGELES—A proposed California bill that would require independent medical examinations into the deaths of individuals who die in-custody has cleared the State Assembly and is in the State Senate with a recent Committee on Local Government vote of 5-1 in favor of passing the bill.
Assembly Bill 1108 (The Forensic Accountability, Custodial Transparency, and Safety (FACTS) Act of 2025) would prohibit the sheriff-coroner from performing an autopsy in any county in which the offices of the sheriff and the coroner are combined. It was sponsored by Democratic Assemblymembers Gregg Hart, Mike Gipson and LaShae Sharp-Collins.
According to Assemblymember Hart, California is one of only 3 states in the country to allow sheriffs to simultaneously serve as coroners. In 48 counties across the state, he stated, elected sheriffs are tasked with investigating all suspicious and unattended deaths, including deaths that occur in their custody, noted a recent news release on the status of the bill.
“In-custody deaths demand independent oversight to maintain public trust and ensure transparency. AB 1108 will eliminate conflicts of interest by requiring impartial medical examinations, so families and communities can have confidence in the integrity of these investigations,” stated Assemblymember Hart.
In the aftermath of a death in a jail, the same officials responsible for keeping incarcerated individuals safe are also tasked with conducting death investigations and medical examinations, he said, citing a 2024 Santa Barbara County Grand Jury report identifying real and perceived conflicts of interest that arise from this arrangement.
Existing law specifies the officers of a county, including, but not limited to, the coroner, and authorizes the board of supervisors of a county to consolidate the duties of various county offices in various combinations, including those of the sheriff and the coroner.
Starting Jan. 1, 2027, AB 1108 would, in any county in which the offices of the sheriff and the coroner are combined, prohibit the sheriff-coroner from determining the circumstances, manner, and cause of death, as provided, for an in-custody death, as defined.
The bill, instead, would require the sheriff-coroner to contract with another county that has a coroner’s office that operates independently from the office of the sheriff, that has established an office of medical examiner.
Or a third-party medical examination provider that is separate and independent from the office of the sheriff-coroner and meets certain physician qualification requirements to determine the circumstances, manner, and cause of death.
But these solutions fall short, say opponents of the bill.
Often in law enforcement investigations, the coroner works together with investigators. Transparency, truth and justice should be the ultimate goals when it comes to accountability.
According to an April 2025 Assembly Bill Policy Committee Analysis, the duality of sheriff-coroners may present a conflict of interest. Medical experts determine a subject’s cause of death, but the sheriff, as an elected official, possesses final say in determining a subject’s manner of death.
Social justice activist Cephus “Uncle Bobby” X Johnson testified before the Senate committee in opposition to the proposed California bill. He and other opponents say it provides a veneer of accountability while actually making things worse.
While under AB 1108 the sheriffs will no longer have a say in how coroners conduct autopsies, they would have the right to pick and choose what examiner they bring in, said Mr. Johnson, whose nephew, Oscar Grant III, was killed in 2009 by a former Bay Area Rapid Transit police officer in Oakland, California.
“So now, they’re going to bring in the ones that’s more biased for them, so nobody else would have input on their selection, which means they’ve still got the ultimate control on the outcome, and that’s why we were pushing against it,” Mr. Johnson told The Final Call.
It indicates that in San Joaquin County, for example, “a lawsuit was filed in 2018 alleging the sheriff’s department changed an autopsy report at the center of a police excessive-force case.
The year before in that same county, two pathologists resigned from the office and alleged that the sheriff changed the manner of death in autopsy reports without their knowledge.
The pathologists called for a split of the offices so that the independence of the coroner could be guaranteed. The San Joaquin County Board of Supervisors ultimately voted to replace the coroner’s office with a medical examiner.
“This potential conflict of interest associated with Sheriff-Coroners was reiterated in a recent Sheriff-Coroner’s use of “excited delirium” as a cause of death in a law-enforcement related death.
This diagnosis has become increasingly controversial as it is generally attributed to sudden, unexplained deaths of individuals while in police custody, which may be used as a justification for excessive police force. This diagnosis has since been prohibited,” the analysis stated.
The analysis reported further, “This was most notably demonstrated in December 2020 when Angelo Quinto died in police custody while suffering a mental health episode. Quinto’s family alleged that a responding officer knelt on Angelo’s neck for nearly five minutes while another officer restrained his legs, causing Angelo to lose consciousness.
He later died in the hospital. The Contra Costa County’s Coroner Office, which is combined with its Sheriff’s office, ruled the cause of Angelo’s death was a result of ‘excited delirium.’”
“It is unrealistic to expect a neighboring county’s Sheriff-Coroner’s office to implicate the original county’s Sheriff—especially when the original county will eventually be the one examining a death from the neighboring county,” stated Justice for Angelo Quinto,” in opposition to an earlier version of the bill.
As long as law enforcement investigates itself, there can be no accountability, his family stated to the Assembly Committee on Local Government.
Supporters of a previous version of the bill, including the California Medical Association, Californians for Safety and Justice and the Ella Baker Center for Human Rights, stated to the Assembly Committee on Local Government that “AB 1108 will ensure that independent medical examinations are conducted for people who die in custody at county jails or in circumstances involving use of force by sheriff’s personnel.
This bill will protect the integrity of the medical examination process and improve public trust in the outcomes of these investigations … .”
The Honorable Minister Louis Farrakhan addressed this issue of justice in a message he delivered several years ago, and it remains applicable today. “Any decent human being who has a responsibility of government must see to it that the people and their right of freedom is protected. They must see that the people get justice and equal protection under the law.
It is for this reason that the founding fathers of America decided to break away from England, because they felt that The Creator had endowed all of us with certain inalienable rights that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness and to this end, governments are formed,” Minister Farrakhan stated in a October 24, 1987, titled, “Justice: A Prerequisite for Life,” delivered in Indianapolis.
“But when those governments become an enemy to that life, liberty and pursuit of happiness, then the founding fathers said they would break the ties that bind them to that order, and set up a new order that will give them that which that government that they are separating from has denied them.
‘What are you saying, Farrakhan?’ I’m saying that it is the duty of the mayor, the police chief, the coroner, and the judicial system to render justice—it is not the place of the police department to be the sole ‘judge, jury and executioner,’” Minister Farrakhan stated.
The Final Call