Newly elected Lake County Coroner Richard Keller said Wednesday that his office will no longer handle cremations for the poor, a controversial practice that he criticized during the campaign.
“We’ll contract those cases out to local funeral homes,” said Keller, a Democrat who made the cremations an issue during his race against Republican incumbent Jim Wipper.
Wipper, a licensed funeral director, received $1,000 from the state to cover each funeral, but had the bodies cremated for $150 and pocketed the difference.
Keller, 50, joined three incumbent countywide officeholders at Wednesday’s swearing-in ceremonies in the Lake County Building in Waukegan.
State’s Atty. Michael Waller, Circuit Court Clerk Sally Coffelt and Recorder of Deeds Mary Ellen Vanderventer also were successful in last month’s election.
During the campaign, Keller asked the Illinois attorney general’s office to investigate whether any state laws were broken when Wipper used county vehicles to transport the bodies of indigent people to a local crematorium.
The bodies had been referred to Wipper by the Lake County public guardian and administrator’s office, which represents poor people with no known living relatives. The office also refers cases to funeral homes.
Wipper justified the use of the county vehicles as a trade-off for the hours he spent using his personal telephone while serving in the coroner’s office for nearly 20 years. He was chief deputy for 16 years before he was appointed to the post after last year’s midterm resignation of Barbara Richardson.
Keller said he will continue pressuring the state to conduct an investigation.
“It will be easier for me to follow up with them now that I have a title behind my name,” he added.
Melissa Merz, a spokeswoman for the attorney general’s office, said the request was under review.
Keller, a Waukegan physician, quit his job as director of the free health clinic he founded to take over the coroner’s post.
He also announced Wednesday the formation of a seven-member ethics panel to help him avoid conflicts of interest.
Keller said he plans to conduct a public education campaign in local high schools on subjects like teenage suicide and the dangers of illicit drugs.
The coroner determines the cause and manner of death, mostly in suspected homicides, suicides and accidents.
The 10-person office hires pathologists to conduct autopsies. Keller will earn $92,540 a year.
Named to Keller’s ethics panel are David Shiner, director of operations at Shimer College in Waukegan; Dennis Mudd, chaplain with the Lake County sheriff’s office; Mary Clare Jakes, former executive director of Catholic Charities in Lake County; Phil Carrigan, a Waukegan community activist; Mary Jane Flament-Garcia, a hospital products company manager; Jack McKeever, chief of the Lindenhurst Police Department; and Mike Soucy, investigations commander of the Buffalo Grove Police Department.
