Cobb County Chief Medical Examiner Brian Frist, whose $475,000-a-year salary was criticized in an internal audit earlier this year, says he will resign from the position Sept. 30.
Frist has held the contract job since 1999, and said in a letter earlier this month to Cobb County Manager David Hankerson that the resignation corresponds with his retirement from his medical practice. The two-sentence letter is dated July 11.
An April internal audit of the office found that Frist was performing his job without supervision, that the amount of his contract had risen dramatically in recent years, and that the contract allowed him to use county facilities and personnel for private autopsies at no charge.
The audit suggested that the county solicit bids from other doctors interested in doing the job.
“There is no functional oversight of the ME’s contract nor … operations,” the audit says. “The private use of the county facilities for profit could expose the county to liabilities.”
Frist could not be reached for comment Saturday, but he told The Atlanta Journal Constitution in April that county employees working for his private practice did so off the clock.
“All (expenses) are paid for by me, not the county,” Frist said, referring to his private practice.
Cobb is one of just a handful of counties in Georgia that have a medical examiner, making the switch from a coroner in 1973. The Medical Examiner’s Office is responsible for determining the cause and manner of death, which can be used by the courts.
A coroner, on the other hand, is an elected official who is not required to be a physician, because they do not perform forensic pathological services.
The county’s ME contract has never been competitively bid, despite dramatically rising costs in recent years. In 1983, the contract was for $150,000, from which the examiner had to pay salaries of a handful of office employees. By the time Frist took over the position, four county employees had been added to the office and the value of the contract had grown to $355,000.
Today, Frist’s contract says that all investigators, technicians and administrative staff are paid by the county. It’s unclear how much of the $475,000 contract goes to Frist, but the audit points out that personnel was previously his biggest expense, and that is now covered by taxpayers.
The audit made several recommendations for improvement, including: requiring the examiner to report to the county manager or public safety director; require periodic reports from the examiner; stop the use of county employees in the examiner’s private practice; and seek county attorney advice on the examiner’s private use of county facilities.
Cobb Commissioner Bob Ott said the county must decide whether to enter a contract with another physician, hire a company to perform the service, or possibly use the Georgia Bureau of Investigation. Ott said he would like to see the audit recommendations implemented if another physician is hired under contract.
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