How have landmark court cases shaped public access to autopsy reports in Colorado, Connecticut, and South Carolina?
Executive summary
Landmark rulings and statutes in Colorado, Connecticut, and South Carolina have created three distinct models for public access to autopsy reports: Colorado’s judiciary-driven presumption of openness subject to narrow judicial withholding, Connecticut’s statute-driven discretionary access tied to “legitimate” or substantial interest, and South Carolina’s judicial determination that autopsy reports are medical records generally exempt from public-records laws [1] [2] [3]. These outcomes reflect competing pressures—transparency and oversight versus privacy and investigative confidentiality—and have produced divergent practical pathways for journalists, families, and prosecutors to obtain autopsy information [1] [2] [4].
1. Colorado: a court-created presumption of public access with narrow exceptions
Colorado’s jurisprudence has long treated autopsy reports as public records subject to the Colorado Open Records Act, with the Colorado Supreme Court and subsequent decisions—exemplified in Denver Publishing Co. v. Dreyfus and related case law—holding that coroners’ autopsy reports (except for minors) are generally open for inspection and may be withheld only through the statutory CORA procedure showing “substantial injury to the public interest” [1]. The state statute C.R.S. § 24-72-204(a)(I) and appellate guidance require a coroner seeking to withhold such reports to apply to district court and meet that high bar, creating a default of disclosure and making courts the gatekeepers of any secrecy [1]. That model privileges public oversight—especially in deaths involving law enforcement—while still permitting judicial balancing when release would demonstrably harm a compelling public interest [1].
2. Connecticut: statutory discretion and the “legitimate” interest hook
Connecticut’s framework is more explicitly statutory and discretionary: the state law permits disclosure in certain circumstances and, in practice, allows agencies maintaining autopsy-related materials to grant or deny access when they deem appropriate, while recognizing that persons with a “legitimate” interest cannot be denied access under some provisions [2]. The 50-state survey cited by the Connecticut General Assembly’s report highlights that Connecticut is among a small group where disclosure is permitted but left to custodial discretion, and that some statutes carve out access based on demonstrated interest or through court orders when public interest considerations weigh in favor of release [2]. That leaves Connecticut in a middle position—neither a blanket public-rights regime nor an across-the-board privacy rule—but one where outcomes often depend on agency practice and judicial interpretation of “legitimate” or “substantial” interest [2].
3. South Carolina: a judicial pivot toward privacy and medical-record classification
South Carolina’s State Supreme Court took a contrasting path when it decided that coroner autopsy reports are medical records and therefore fall outside the state’s public-records law, a ruling rooted in litigation following The Item of Sumter’s request for an autopsy report in a police-shooting case [3] [5]. The Sumter County dispute—where the coroner initially denied release by invoking medical-privacy protections and the newspaper obtained the report from another source—culminated in appellate rulings and commentary that the Supreme Court ultimately treated autopsy reports as exempt under South Carolina FOIA, effectively prioritizing privacy and administrative discretion over press access in that jurisdiction [3] [4] [6]. Critics and transparency advocates in South Carolina argued this decision removes a key oversight tool, especially in deaths involving public officials, while defenders emphasize family privacy and the sensitivity of forensic material [4] [7].
4. Comparative implications, conflicts, and remaining questions
Taken together, these precedents create a patchwork: Colorado’s court-mandated openness with narrow judicially supervised exceptions [1]; Connecticut’s statutory, custodial-discretion approach tethered to “legitimate” interest [2]; and South Carolina’s judicially affirmed privacy classification that limits public access [3]. Each model reflects implicit agendas—media and public-accountability interests pushing for maximum disclosure; coroners and privacy advocates seeking to shield families and investigative integrity—and each shifts the battlefield to courtrooms, agency rules, or statute-writing depending on the state [1] [2] [4]. Reporting and advocacy literature shows these debates are not purely doctrinal: they influence who can scrutinize police conduct, how public-health data are compiled, and what safeguards exist for sensitive material, yet available sources do not fully resolve whether one model yields consistently better outcomes for accountability or privacy across all case types [1] [2] [3].