http://www.azstarnet.com/sn/border/91340.php

Corpse overflow stored in trailer
By Eric Swedlund
ARIZONA DAILY STAR

A refrigerated trailer is being used by the county morgue to help handle an overflow of bodies.

A record number in the deaths of illegal border crossers is being blamed for the Pima County Medical Examiner's Office first-time ever need to use a temporary morgue to store bodies.

The county's morgue, 2825 E. District St., has a capacity of 120 bodies. The trailer can hold an additional 60 to 70 bodies, depending on whether the remains are intact or skeletal.

"If conditions continue like this, it's something we'll have to face every year," said Dr. Bruce Parks, Pima County's chief medical examiner.

The influx of illegal entrant bodies creates a backlog of work for the medical examiner's office and makes it difficult for the staff to keep pace with the normal workload, Parks said, although he offered no details.

Record numbers of illegal border crossers dying in Arizona's southern desert have forced the Pima County Medical Examiner for the first time to use a refrigerated semitrailer to handle the overflow of bodies.

More than 200 illegal immigrants are known to have died in Arizona in the fiscal year that ends Sept. 30, according to a review of medical examiner and Mexican consulate records.

The Border Patrol's Tucson Sector, which includes all of Arizona except Yuma and a strip on the state's western edge, puts the number of bodies found at 193, 72 more than at this point the previous year, and well above the 141 counted for the previous fiscal year, said Jose Garza, a spokesman for the Border Patrol in Tucson.

The bodies found in Pima County go to the Office of the Medical Examiner, which passed capacity earlier this summer and had to expand into a rented portable facility, said Dr. Bruce Parks, chief medical examiner.

The county's morgue has a capacity of 120 bodies, while the truck holds an additional 60 to 70, depending on whether the bodies are intact or skeletal remains.

This summer is the first time the county morgue surpassed its capacity and had to use an additional facility, Parks said.

The county rented a truck in May 2001 after the bodies of 14 illegal immigrants were found in the desert east of Yuma, but the morgue didn't need the additional capacity, Parks said. The facility has since been upgraded.

The county morgue needs to build another permanent cooler to double its capacity, Parks said.

"If conditions continue like this, it's something we'll have to face every year," he said.

The semitrailer was ordered in late July after the morgue was inundated with the bodies of illegal entrants and the cooler had no reserve space, Parks said. The semitrailer costs $1,000 a week to rent and operate.

"This is the first time we've ever got a separate refrigerated unit and had to use it," he said.

More than half of the morgue's cooler space is occupied by illegal entrants, Parks said, and more space is one of the top funding priorities for the medical examiner's office.

Gov. Janet Napolitano declared a state of emergency on Aug. 15, with $1.5 million of state funds available, but it's unclear how the money will be spent.

Parks estimates that handling the bodies of illegal immigrants costs the medical examiner's office more than $100,000 a year.