Forty years after his daughter's death, a Hobart father has found out parts of her body may have been retained by a pathology museum without the family's consent. A Tasmanian coroner is investigating after the R. A. Rodda Museum of Pathology advised it may have remains from 147 people possibly retained without the knowledge or consent of the families. Coroner Simon Cooper says he expects to publish a finding "within the next few months".
00:00Albie's daughter is buried at this cemetery in southern Tasmania.
00:07She was just two years old when she died at the Royal Hobart Hospital.
00:12Forty years after her death, Albie, who doesn't want to use his real name,
00:17has been hit by another wave of grief,
00:20finding out parts of his daughter's body may have been kept by a pathology museum
00:25without the family's knowledge or consent.
00:29I came down here through the week and I apologise to my daughter.
00:39You know, for what's happened.
00:42In 2016, the R.A. Rodder Museum of Pathology at the University of Tasmania
00:48told the coroner's office it may have in its collection
00:51specimens possibly retained from coronial autopsies without family consent.
00:57The coroner's office made the situation public last year as it worked to contact relatives.
01:04Initially, the coroner's office said there were 147 potential cases from between 1953 and 1985.
01:12Some next of kin were identified, but a list of 126 names was published in Tasmanian newspapers in January in a bid for further information.
01:24We need to have questions answered about how this happened, who was responsible and who should have had oversight over these circumstances.
01:33We need to be really honest about whether any laws were broken or standards breached in this.
01:38So there's been, I think, a really big change, but it's been probably relatively recent and I suspect we're not done with finding out things that have happened in the recent past that we nowadays would be quite concerned about.
01:51Albie is yet to find out more about his daughter's case, but has been offered a phone call from the coroner's office.
01:58I've put it off. It's too distressing.
02:02The coroner's office says it continues to manage inquiries as the investigation continues.
02:09It says support has been arranged for family members who've come forward and that coroners and the office work hard to ensure they're as trauma informed as possible.
