Bid to add time limit for second post-mortem examinations on homicide victims

A proposal has been put forward to enforce a two-week time limit on when post-mortem examinations can be requested by accused killers

Female scientist in laboratory

The proposed bill by the SNP's Gil Paterson hopes to reduce the number of delays facing grieving families before they can bury their loved ones.

Pathologists carry out a post-mortem examination on the bodies of people who die in suspicious circumstances, including cases of murder and culpable homicide but under the current rules, a suspect can request another examination be carried out at any point, no time limit is enforced.

My Paterson's bill proposes that a 14-day time limit be introduced for the defendant’s lawyer to request a second post-mortem examination.

My Paterson cited the 2016 case of murdered school girl, 15-year-old, Paige Doherty saying that her body was only released to her family 30 days after she had been killed because of the time taken by the murderer’s lawyer to request a defence post-mortem examination.

Giving evidence to Holyrood’s Justice Committee, Mr Paterson said: “This will, I hope, reduce delays in the release of the body by encouraging the defence to act more quickly.”

He added: “It will also increase transparency in the system, helping families to understand what is happening, reducing distress and giving them more certainty about the timescales within which funeral arrangements can be made.

There are estimated to be between two and 10 cases of defence post-mortem examinations from approximately 60 yearly homicide cases in Scotland.

The committee will now consider the case for the changes before the Scottish Parliament votes on whether the Member’s Bill should proceed to stage two of the process to becoming law.

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