( CNN ) -- Michael Brown , Eric Garner and John Crawford all have one thing in common : It 's not just that they were unarmed men of color killed by police officers -- it 's that the responsibility to investigate each of their deaths fell to a medical examiner . We medical examiners investigate all homicides and violent deaths , and it is also part of our legal duty to investigate any death of a person under the control of , or in the custody of , a law enforcement agent . I have worked as a medical examiner for 13 years in four large cities in the United States . Medical examiner offices are independent public agencies , and one of our responsibilities is to act as quality control over law enforcement agencies . The medical examiner is the final arbiter of whether a death was the direct result of an arrest , or , instead , the result of natural disease or an incidental event . Medical examiner reports in most states are public records . We all deserve and should expect transparency in death investigation . The family of the deceased , the news media and anyone who asks for it can get a copy of the medical examiner 's or coroner 's autopsy report on any case that is not sealed as part of an active investigation . Medical examiners are physicians , specialists in forensic pathology . We are professionally protective of our independence . We know that it is our duty and responsibility , as the doctors who perform the autopsy , to speak for the dead . Unfortunately , in the wake of the death of a civilian at the hand of police officers , the public is often suspicious of the medical examiner . Because the law requires a local government agency to perform the death investigation , people often assume that this agency falls under the jurisdiction or influence of the police . News reports critical of the amount of time the dead body was left at the scene , or the amount of time it takes to get a final autopsy report , exacerbate this distrust . In St. Louis County , Missouri , where Michael Brown was autopsied , Dr. Mary Case , the chief medical examiner , is a board-certified forensic pathologist . She has years of experience and reports to the Health Department , not the police . Brown 's official autopsy report was expedited and finalized on Monday . It was made available to the prosecuting attorney , who is now in charge of any release of information . Why does a death scene investigation take so long ? An outdoor death scene is a messy and complicated place . As soon as the person has been declared dead , the area has to be frozen in time to ensure that we , the public , can later learn what really happened there . Crime scene photographers and trained evidence collection analysts have to `` process the scene , '' an hourslong procedure when done properly . The body , the position of any vehicles , the lighting , the height of adjacent structures -- everything needs to be photographed from multiple angles . In a shooting , crime scene investigators will have to measure and document the number and location of the casings , bullets and strike marks . If the evidence and its undisturbed location are not documented in this painstaking way , then criminal or civil complaints against the officer may not stand up in court . But what about the autopsy report ? Why does that take so long ? That 's because a competent job in the morgue , too , takes time . The work I do as a doctor in the autopsy suite after a typical gunshot wound homicide case may take three or four hours to complete , but after I leave the morgue , the report is not done . I have to wait for the report from the toxicology lab , which usually takes a minimum of two weeks , and for histology slides to come back before I can examine them under a microscope . Any of these findings could impact the cause of death . Even gunshot wounds can not be interpreted in a vacuum . As part of an investigation I have to try to figure out which defects in the body come from bullets entering , and which from their exit . Usually these wounds are distinctly different in appearance , but the more complex the body position of the deceased , the more complicated things get . Exit wounds in flesh pressed against the ground or against tight clothing can appear just like entrance wounds . An entrance wound inflicted through an intermediary target that deformed the bullet can look just like an exit wound . Sometimes I have to wait for the police reports or witness transcripts in to correctly interpret what I see on the body in the autopsy suite . After the shooting in Ferguson , Michael Brown 's family hired Dr. Michael Baden , a former New York State Police medical examiner , to conduct a second autopsy , and the federal Department of Justice instructed the Armed Forces Medical Examiner to conduct a third . What you can tell from a second or third autopsy is limited by autopsy artifact -- changes to the evidence caused by the performance of the first autopsy . In the course of the first , legally mandated autopsy , the forensic pathologist will have taken the organs out and sliced them apart for examination . The gunshot wounds will have been probed , and sometimes even cut into . More importantly , any pathologist hired by the family , regardless of expertise , does not have access to the crime scene and other evidence . Even Baden , in the report he prepared for the Brown family , concluded that without the clothing , evidence or scene information , he had `` too little information to forensically reconstruct the shooting . '' Why were n't the St. Louis medical examiner 's autopsy findings made public immediately ? Because releasing preliminary information when the investigation is still ongoing is premature and potentially inflammatory . Already the results of Baden 's limited investigation are being used to support the contention that Brown was surrendering , and that the wounds were distant range , even though Baden himself said neither . To a forensic pathologist , the body diagram Brown 's attorneys released tells a different story . The wound at the top of the head , the frontal wounds and angled right hand and arm wounds suggest that the victim was facing the officer , leaning forward with his right arm possibly extended in line with the gun 's barrel , and not above his head . The image of a person standing upright with his hands in the air when he was shot does not appear compatible with the wounds documented on that diagram . Whether a forward-leaning position is a posture of attack or of surrender , however , is a matter of perspective . From the perspective of a witness , it could appear that the leaning person is complying with the officer and getting down . From the perspective of the officer , he may appear to be coming at him . Partial evidence yields partial answers , and a rush to conclusions based on one isolated set of data from a second autopsy only raises more questions . That is why it is so important to be patient and wait for all the scene information to come to light . But `` be patient and wait '' is not a demand that anyone has the right to make on a family that has lost a loved one in a sudden and violent event . When I have been assigned to investigate an in-custody or officer-involved death , I will often call the family right away . It 's important to me to reach out to them , to tell the people who are awaiting answers from me that I am qualified to do the job I am trained for ; that I will hide nothing from them ; that everything I do on their behalf will be part of the public record ; and to give them some idea of how long the process might take . When the report is finished , I meet with family members or their attorneys to discuss the findings and explain the medical diagnoses I have come to . This solemn conference takes place behind the scenes , months after the incident , and is never reported in the news media -- but it is probably the most important part of my job . As a doctor and a civil servant , I take my public role seriously . I strive to with all my ability , training and effort to answer any questions that person 's family may have . I know that others in my field strive with the same effort . It 's why we went into our field of medicine . We are servants of the public -- not of the state , not of any single law firm , and not of the police . Magazine : The Aftermath in Ferguson .
Judy Melinek : Medical examiners act as quality control over law enforcement agencies . Melinek : Body diagram of Michael Brown suggests he was facing the officer , leaning forward . She says as doctors who perform the autopsy , medical examiners speak for the dead . Melinek : Public should trust medical examiners ' report since they act independent .