Tarrant County medical examiner interviewed

Architect hired for Guinn project

By Leia Jobe

reporter2@trcle.com

Johnson County commissioners interviewed Tarrant County’s medical examiner Monday and hired an architect to finish a project on the third floor of the Guinn Justice Center.

Dr. Nizam Peerwani would take over for medical examiner Dr. Arthur L. Raines, who has been working in Johnson County since 1976. Raines’ retirement will take effect June 30.

Peerwani is the medical examiner for Tarrant, Denton and Parker counties. The three counties have an interlocal agreement, first created in 1965, which shares the cost of medical examiner services.

If commissioners decide to appoint Peerwani as Johnson County Medical Examiner, Johnson County would enter into an interlocal agreement with Tarrant County, which governs and funds the cooperative agreement. Denton and Parker counties would need to ratify the agreement.

Peerwani presented background information to the court Monday about the duties and standard operating procedures of the Tarrant County medical examiner’s office. The office has a $5.5 million annual operating cost and serves 1.8 million people in Tarrant, Denton and Parker counties, Peerwani said. The cost of running a medical examiner’s office should be between $1.50 and $3 a year per capita, he said.

Though commissioners have not yet officially hired Peerwani, County Judge Roger Harmon, Sheriff Bob Alford and Raines all announced their support of him Monday, saying he would be a good addition to the county.

“I would be very much in support of this,” Alford said. “Dr. Raines has done a wonderful job, but Dr. Peerwani has more resources available to him. It would be a lot faster turnaround for us from a prosecution standpoint, and Dr. Peerwani’s office has a great reputation statewide.”

Raines’ offices are located at Harris Methodist Walls Regional Hospital. If commissioners hire Peerwani, bodies will be transported to Tarrant County for autopsy. The cost of transporting the bodies could be significant, Peerwani said.

“I’m going to look at the number of bodies from the last few years,” Peerwani said. “That trend is very important because it tells us what to expect in the coming year as far as the number of deaths.”

Peerwani will bring his data to the commissioners in one or two weeks, he said. At that time the commissioners may make a final decision.

Raines’ lead death investigator, Tyler Morris, said he supported the interlocal agreement with Tarrant County.

“I really think this is a very positive system,” Morris said. “It will be well worth the cost.”

Commissioners also hired architect Alan Magee to finish the north and south offices on the third floor of the Guinn Justice Center and approved a local option election for Keene that would allow the sale of wine and beer for off-premise consumption.

The offices on the third floor of the Guinn building were not completed when it was restored in 2004. With the restoration of the Johnson County Courthouse, the offices are now empty and can finally be completed, Harmon said.

Commissioners discussed other building projects during Monday’s meeting.

The cost of the roof repair for the Johnson County Corrections Center increased by $2,740.

Contractor Richard Reynolds submitted the extra bill to the commissioners for razor wire. His company, Action Commercial Contractors, will be paid $222,740 to repair the roof of the jail.

“We did an infrared scan on the roof on Thursday night to check for wet insulation,” Reynolds said. “We had one small area that was four feet by 10 feet of wet insulation.”

Reynolds’s company will replace the wet insulation at no charge, he said.

Commissioners also discussed the possibility of raising the minimum bid for mineral rights in the future and options for matching a $51,000 cost-share grant from the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality.