Cowlitz County coroner confuses 2 dead babies; 1 family buries wrong infant
Cowlitz County Coroner Dana Tucker confirms two dead babies were mixed up at the morgue during her predecessor’s tenure, with one family receiving and burying the wrong child in summer 2022.
Meanwhile, the other mother says she never received the remains of her baby, and coroner records show the body was cremated after not being claimed.
The mother of the unclaimed body, Chelsea R. Hurst, 31, of Cowlitz County, told the Daily News in October the coroner’s office confirmed the mistake with her.
Hurst said the office told her the remains of both babies were initially planned to be sent to the same Kelso funeral home, but only one was sent, Hurst’s child.
That body was given to a different family, buried, then exhumed and eventually cremated.
After a two-year investigation by the Daily News, the coroner’s office admitted the errors to the paper in late December.
A county document, titled “Morgue Intake 2022,” shows both bodies were at the county morgue at the same time, and Tucker later confirmed this in an email.
Khalisee Crabill — the daughter of Vanessa Barker of Longview and Robert Crabill, Jr. of Kelso — died on July 1, 2022, at a Kelso home, according to her death certificate. It is unclear why.
Hurst had given birth to a stillborn 3-pound girl, whom she considered naming Angel, about a month prior.
The errors weren’t discovered until January 2023, after Tucker’s first term started, she said, blaming a person no longer working at the coroner’s who did not follow protocol. She did not name the culprit.
When her office realized the mistake, she said staff immediately called both families, although according to Hurst, she didn’t hear about the mistake until later.
A representative from Khalisee’s family confirmed they were informed of the mistake in January 2023. By that time, Hurst’s baby had already been buried in Khalisee’s grave for about six months.
Representatives from the funeral home, Green Hills Memorial Gardens & Crematory on Mount Brynion Road, declined to talk to the Daily News.
The coroner in office at the time of the mix-up, Tim Davidson, also declined to talk to the Daily News. During his last years in office, he faced other allegations, including of fraud and a toxic workplace.
Despite a 2021 report by Washington State Patrol in which Davidson admitted to receiving travel reimbursements from the county when he was already paid by professional organizations, the Clark County Prosecutor’s Office never filed charges.
Despite those controversies, Davidson ran for reelection in November 2022 but lost to Tucker.
When Khalisee’s family was informed of the mistake in January 2023, Maggie Waits of Longview said her family was told that the body they buried the previous summer was not her 2-month-old granddaughter Khalisee.
Coroner office phone records show the office also called Khalisee’s dad around this time. The parents were not together. A crowdsourcing fundraising website states he died in July 2024.
Khalisee’s funeral occurred around July 2022, according to her mother’s Facebook page. Khalisee’s mom only briefly talked with the Daily News, while Waits provided details. Eventually, Waits declined to talk to the Daily News after she said the family secured a lawyer.
Waits said Khalisee died suddenly, but didn’t say the cause.
Born April 30, 2022, Khalisee died about two months later, according to her death certificate, which does not list the cause or manner of death.
With the wrong baby placed in Khalisee’s grave, Khalisee’s body remained at the morgue, according to her grandmother.
Waits said her “helpless little body laid on a slab for seven months before she could be laid to rest.”
Timeline
April 30, 2022: Khalisee Brian Crabill is born.
June 7, 2022: Chelsea Hurst gives birth to a baby girl who is not breathing and declared dead.
July 1, 2022: Khalisee Brian Crabill dies.
July 2022: Khalisee Brian Crabill is buried at Green Mountain Memorial Gardens & Crematory in Kelso.
January 2023: The Cowlitz County Coroner’s Office confirms the Crabill family was given the wrong body. The Crabill family says they are contacted about the mistake.
Spring 2023: The body of Hurst’s baby is authorized to be cremated, according to coroner records.
Unclaimed remains
Hurst, professionally a roofer, said she recalls little about the day she fell from a one-story building while on a job. Despite being 30 weeks along, she didn’t know she was pregnant until just the week before.
“I don’t know,” she said. “I guess I blacked out because I don’t remember falling. I don’t remember anything.”
Authorities were called to PeaceHealth St. John Medical Center that day in June 2022, because the newborn died under suspicious circumstances. Coroner investigator Rebecca Fieken, according to a police report, requested police assistance because she had previously conducted a death investigation involving Hurst in 2019 under similar circumstances.
Medical staff at the hospital attempted to resuscitate the infant, but after about 45 minutes, her baby girl was pronounced dead, according to the report.
The police report shows her baby died from lack of oxygen to the brain, but fentanyl and methamphetamine intoxication were other significant factors. The manner of death is listed as undetermined.
Though the Crabill family eventually received the right body, Hurst said she never did. She said she called the coroner’s office and the funeral home right after her baby’s death, but both said the remains weren’t there. She said she also never received a death certificate.
Tucker said if bodies aren’t claimed, families don’t receive death certificates. When dead bodies go unclaimed, the county cremates the remains, she added.
The remains of Hurst’s baby weren’t sent to Green Hills for the second time until spring 2023.
Tucker signed a cremation authorization for Hurst’s infant in April 2023, according to coroner records.
A May 2023 document confirms the office released Hurst’s infant to Green Hills Memorial Gardens & Crematory. That document is signed by former Cowlitz County Chief Deputy Coroner Kimberly Carroll and includes an order for a baby brass urn.
The Daily News requested public records between employees discussing the situation. In one text message between Carroll and an unknown recipient, a staff member asked Carroll in early January 2023 if she “want(s) to deal with Crabill?” Carroll replied, “I can.”
The rules
When Khalisee and Hurst’s baby died, funeral homes and mortuaries had to hold unclaimed dead bodies for 90 days, but a Washington state bill shrunk the window to 45 days in June 2024.
However, bodies in morgues can remain longer. Wahkiakum County’s outgoing coroner Daniel H. Bigelow said it is up to an individual coroner to keep bodies longer than the state’s requirement, even after bodies are identified and autopsies are performed.
For example, among the reasons bodies might be held longer is because they may be needed as evidence in a criminal trial, he said.
Hospitals are not required to notify the coroner’s office if a failed pregnancy was at or less than 21 weeks along at the time of the stillbirth, Tucker said, 21 weeks being the point of viability, or survival.
Longview’s PeaceHealth spokesperson Debra Carnes said when fetal deaths occur at 20 weeks or more, the hospital’s spiritual care team helps, then the county coroner is contacted, and the remains are turned over.
Already under scrutiny
The former local coroner, Davidson, was appointed to office in 2006, then ran unopposed in each election before being challenged in the November 2022 race, the one he lost to Tucker. In his final years in office, the state investigated him for fraud.
A Washington State Patrol report says Davidson told state auditor investigators “he knowingly received reimbursement funds from” two industry organizations for Cowlitz County-paid travel expenses and offered to repay the county with personal funds.
Davidson previously told the Daily News he had not repaid the funds by the time he was asked by investigators because the county had not requested the money.
The State Auditor’s Office reports Davidson accepted more than $12,600 in personal reimbursements for travel expenses that had been paid by the county between Feb. 10, 2016, and May 10, 2019. The WSP investigation confirmed auditor findings but dismissed other allegations — including that he created a hostile work environment and hired unfit staff — as either unsubstantiated or not criminal in nature.
Tucker said her office values its integrity and aims to prevent similar mistakes from happening again.
“We sincerely apologize for the distress this may have caused the families in their time of grief,” she wrote in an email.