By Nina Thompson for Mirror Indy.
Broadcast version by Joe Ulery for Indiana News Service reporting for the Mirror Indy-Free Press Indiana-Public News Service Collaboration.

Brenda McMahan is no stranger to death.

The Anderson native grew up above what was then the Rozelle funeral home on West Eighth Street, where her father was a mortician.

Despite the wide, welcoming porch none of her friends wanted to visit there, nor were there many trick-or-treaters on Halloween night. But mourners gathered to say goodbye to friends and loved ones, and those gatherings prepared McMahan for her decades of working with the deceased.

McMahan is wrapping up a four-year term as coroner in Rush County, which has nearly 17,000 people and is located roughly between Indianapolis and Cincinnati. She spent nearly 30 years before that as an excise officer in Indiana. She’s investigated natural deaths, and those that are the stuff of nightmares.

Death, she said, often brings out the worst in people.

“It brings out everyone’s fears.”

But for a county coroner in rural Indiana, there’s honor and duty in fulfilling the responsibility of serving the area’s residents. Still, that sense of service doesn’t always counteract the low pay and long hours most coroners face. It’s why in many counties, it’s a race that can be void of party politics, because residents are often just happy to have someone qualified in a thankless role.

Such is the case in Rush County, where Scott Medd will succeed McMahan, a Republican, when her term expires. Medd, a Democrat, is running unopposed for the position in a heavily Republican county.

Medd’s resume makes him more than qualified for the job. He’s worked in fire and EMT services for 30 years, and is a veteran of the Desert Storm campaign in Iraq.

Despite his training, he may not have won against a less qualified Republican opponent because of that party’s dominance in the county.

“A lot of people said, ‘why bother?’ So I respect and I appreciate the Republican Party thinking enough of me that they did not put anybody up against me,” Medd said.

Politics shouldn’t matter, he said. Ability, and a willingness to step up, should.

“Not everybody wants to do the job.”

Why is the county coroner elected?

The 2024 general election includes federal- and state-level roles on the ballot — presidential, gubernatorial and senatorial races will make this November one to remember. But Rush County voters will also cast ballots for the less-than-glamorous role of county coroner.

It’s a job almost no one thinks about, unless or until someone needs help.

The coroner and/or deputy coroners arrive at calls that could be everything from a natural death at a nursing home to a fatal car crash. They interview witnesses to get a complete idea of what happened, investigate to rule out homicide, perhaps collect maggot samples, or testify in local court hearings, console grieving families or order autopsies.

Then, using every piece of information, the coroner ultimately has to record the cause, manner and mechanism of death. But before the investigations and training begin, the coroner has to get elected into office, running with a party.

“I don’t think the coroner ought to be one party or the other, because we serve both parties the same way. We don’t treat a Republican better than we treat a Democrat or a Democrat better than a Republican,” said Tony Ciriello, Indiana Coroners Training Board director of training.

“So I think our position ought not be a partisan position and not have an affiliation, but it’s not that way because it’s (mandated) by state constitution.”

Technically, in order to be qualified, a person must be elected and have lived in their county of election for at least one year, according to the training board. Until 1994, there were no educational resources for Hoosier coroners or their deputies, and no prior qualifications were needed for taking the job. Beginning in 2000, curriculum was developed and training became required for all deputy coroners.

Social, medical and legal sensibilities are intermixed in a county coroner’s job requirements.

From having practical knowledge of local, state and federal laws, codes, ordinances, and procedures to a working knowledge of universal health precautions, or dealing with potentially violent individuals, there are 25 items on the bulleted job requirements list for the Rush County coroner and deputies as of December 2022.

Coroners can also issue subpoenas, authorize autopsies or request toxicological exams of a body, according to the training board.

Duty calls

But despite the long list of responsibilities, current deputy coroner Scott Medd says he is ready for the task of being the new Rush County coroner. He is running for McMahan’s position unopposed, and has completed his certification training.

“I mean, mind you, Indianapolis sees a lot more than we do, don’t get me wrong,” Medd said. “But you know, it all still boils down to the same classes and the same training,” which is a 40-hour course taught twice a year by the training board, as well as an externship.

Having a medical background is incentivized. Indiana law allows that coroners who are medical physicians are granted 1.5 times the base pay of their non-physician counterparts.

While larger counties might have more deaths per year, the work put into an investigation can be taxing no matter where it occurs.

For natural deaths such as old age, “you’re still looking at probably a good eight to 10 hours of work… And then if you’ve got something that’s more in depth, like Valerie Tindall or someone else, I mean, you’re looking at days, weeks, months,” McMahan said.

Tindall, a 17-year-old girl from Rush County, went missing June 8, 2023. During the investigation, McMahan would stay in touch with the sheriff’s department housed in the same building as the coroner’s office, hoping the girl would be found.

After nearly six months of investigation that involved roughly 40 federal agents and local law officers, Valerie’s body was found on a neighbor’s property, according to court documents. In March 2024, Patrick Scott pleaded guilty to Tindall’s murder and was sentenced to more than 50 years in prison.

McMahan said the case is exactly the kind of tragedy no county coroner wants to have to face.

“We just kind of hung out here, hoping that we were never going to be involved, to be honest with you. But once it became obvious that we were going to be involved, we stepped up,” McMahan said.

McMahan ends her term with a $13,000 salary, despite working what she described as a 24/7 schedule. It’s a little different for deputy coroners. For every 24 hours on call, deputies get a $50 stipend. For every investigation they see through from beginning to end, they are paid $110.

“I’m obviously not driving around in the coroner’s van for 24 hours, so I can go do things and be at my house. But you never know when the phone’s gonna ring,” she said.

The job also demands emotional intelligence and professionalism, things that cannot be written on a report.

“A coroner is what they consider a last responder,” said the training board’s Tony Ciriello. First responders like EMT, fire and police officers may be the first on the scene, but the last responders bring closure to families.

“We’re the ones knocking on doors saying, ‘I’m sorry to tell you your mom, your dad, your husband, your wife or child was killed or has died.’ And so how we start that conversation affects the grieving process in a family,” Ciriello said.

So despite, or maybe because of the demands, Medd is ready to step up.

“Somebody has to take the time to want to do the job, you have to be willing to put the effort into getting out of bed at two o’clock in the morning, to go to somebody’s house, or a car wreck or whatever… You have to have that ability to get yourself out to do that, because you’re dealing with families, and if you don’t want to do that, then you know, you’re in the wrong line of work.

But for Medd, service is automatic and Rush County is home.

“Except for my time in the Navy, I’ve always lived here,” he said. “I try to bend over backwards to help people if I can.“


Nina Thompson wrote this article for Mirror Indy.


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Lawmakers in Annapolis plan to introduce a bill to require a special election if a lawmaker is appointed to a seat in the first half of their term.

Maryland's constitution requires the political party committee in the district the former lawmaker represented to pick a replacement to fill the seat. The recommendation then is sent to the governor, who usually approves the person.

Del. Linda Foley, D-Montgomery County, the sponsor of the bill, said voters are sometimes represented by an appointed lawmaker for as long as four years.

"You end up with a rather large percentage of the General Assembly then being appointed and not elected and not facing the voters," Foley pointed out. "This has been an ongoing debate about whether this is a democratic way to replace people."

Nearly a quarter of state legislators in Maryland, including Foley, started in the legislature by political appointment, rather than an election.

The bill would not do away with the appointment process entirely. State legislators serve four-year terms, running in midterm elections. An appointment would be made, though any lawmaker appointed in the first half of the term would have to run in a special election held during the Presidential primary and general elections.

Foley emphasized the bill is not meant to fill every vacancy with a special election, a process she said would be costly.

"There is a cost factor to holding elections all the time and it's not insubstantial," Foley acknowledged. "Not to say that you can put a price on democracy, but you do have to consider what's the cost of doing this. Two years in office without having to face the voters isn't as problematic as four."


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By Marilyn Odendahl for The Indiana Citizen.
Broadcast version by Joe Ulery for Indiana News Service reporting for the Indiana Citizen-Free Press Indiana-Public News Service Collaboration.

For St. Joseph County Circuit Court Clerk Amy Rolfes, the statistics only confirmed what she had been seeing and hearing from voters in the days and weeks leading into the Nov. 5 election.

Nearly 59,000 registered voters in the Northern Indiana county cast a ballot either by mail or by going to the polls before Election Day, topping the number of voters who visited the polls on Nov. 5 by more than 5,000.

However, Rolfes already knew early voting was popular by the public's reaction to St. Joseph County's third early-voting site that was opened this year for the first time. The new polling place was opened two weeks before the general election in Center Township's public library, located in the southern portion of the county.

The site was busy every single day it was operating, Rolfes said, and voters were thanking the staff giving them a convenient place to vote.

"Clearly the voters have spoken," Rolfes said. "They enjoy early voting."

The final vote tallies from the November election show the popularity of early voting was similar across the state to what Rolfes saw in St. Joseph County. According to data from the Indiana Secretary of State, 1.6 million eligible Hoosier voters - 54% of all who cast a ballot in the 2024 general election - voted either absentee or in person prior to Election Day. Comparatively, 1.87 million registered Indiana voters - 61% of those who voted - went to the polls early in the 2020 general election.

Despite the early voting numbers, Indiana's overall voter participation slipped this year. The secretary of state reported that 4.84 million Hoosiers were registered to vote in November, which is 86,085 more than were registered in November 2020. However 2.97 million, or 61%, voted in the 2024 general election, which is 94,349 fewer than the 3.07 million, or 65%, who voted four years ago.

Julia Vaughn, executive director of Common Cause Indiana, said she is disappointed that lawmakers are not doing more to improve the state's voter turnout numbers. Changes that would enable more Hoosiers to vote include same day voter registration, extending voting hours, and prohibiting candidates and their supporters from being any closer than, at least, 100 feet from the entrance of a polling site on Election Day.

"That's frustrating when clearly we have a big problem with turnout and zero problems in term of (election) security, yet our policymakers continue to make voting more restrictive in the name of making it more secure," Vaughn said. "We should be opening it up in the name of getting more people involved."

Demand continues for early voting

Like St. Joseph County, Clark County in Southern Indiana opened another early voting site for the November election.

Clark County Circuit Court Clerk Ryan Lynch said the second polling place, at the R.E.M.C. building along U.S. 60, was a more convenient option for voters in the middle and northern parts of the county. They did not have to travel to the courthouse in downtown Jeffersonville to vote.

Lynch said he believes the additional polling location motivated more people to vote early. Although the 22,522 voters in Clark County who voted either by mail or in-person before Election Day was down from the 28,666 who cast an early ballot in 2020, he does not expect interest in early voting to wither.

"I think we should definitely plan for big turnouts for early voting and put more resources into that to be prepared," Lynch said.

After the Marion County Election Board voted against extending early voting by two hours in the morning, Marion County Circuit Court Clerk Kate Sweeney Bell kept the polling site in the City County Building open until 10 p.m. the Saturday and Sunday before the Nov. 5 election. She said she added hours in the evening to make voting more convenient and had noticed that individuals who voted in the evening were wearing uniforms, indicating they were shift workers in hospitals, law enforcement agencies and private companies.

"It worked," Sweeney Bell said, but she did not commit to extending the hours in future elections.

In Marion County, 165,186, or 46% of registered voters, cast an absentee or early ballot in 2024. That was down from the 215,931, or 55% of registered voters, who voted before Election Day in 2020.

Not only were Hoosiers voting early this year, but they were, apparently, seeking answers to their voting questions sooner.

Ami Gandhi, director of strategic initiatives and the Midwest Voting Rights Program at the Chicago Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights, said during the early-voting period, more Indiana voters were calling the 866-OUR-VOTE election protection hotline the CLCCR established. Also, they were calling before the voter registration deadline passed and before absentee voting began.

"Across the board, we heard from voters in many different parts of the state who have an interest in expanded access to early voting, including voters who wanted more locations in their county (and) voters who were seeking expanded hours and who were shocked, and at times upset, by the relative early end time to early voting on any given day," Gandhi said.

A 'chilling impact,' low turnout

Wells and Whitely counties recorded the highest turnout rates in Indiana at 73% each in November. Marion and St. Joseph counties tallied the lowest turnout rates in the state at 55% each.

Sweeney Bell was disappointed by her county's low turnout. She said the first hour the polls were open on Election Day, about 40,000 people voted in Marion County; however, the rush of voters that usually comes between 4 and 6 p.m. never materialized.

"I'm baffled when people have such power and choose not the exercise it," Sweeney Bell said, adding that voting is essentially asking people who they want making the decisions that will affect every part of their lives. She said she is disappointed and not sure why people chose to stay home, rather than go vote.

"If I knew why, I could do something about it," Sweeney Bell said.

Rolfes tried to encourage voting in St. Joseph County by producing a couple of educational videos. She was allowed to use the local public television station's studio for an hour and half and she made four "super nerdy" videos, providing instruction on such things as voting by mail and using the voting machine to cast a ballot.

"Voting information is key to increasing voter turnout," Rolfes said.

Vaughn, of Common Cause Indiana, said she believes some new voters and naturalized citizens did not go to the polls this year because of the claim by Indiana Attorney General Todd Rokita and Indiana Secretary of State Diego Morales about noncitizens voting in state elections. The two elected officials announced a few weeks before the Nov. 5 election, that they had asked the federal government to verify the citizenship status of 585,774 individuals on Indiana's voting rolls.

Calling the move by Rokita and Morales a "political stunt," Vaughn alleged the whole point of creating the list and the making announcement was to have a "chilling impact" to discourage people from voting. She said the election protection hotline did not get any calls from individuals who had their citizenship status challenged when they tried to vote, but some new voters did call the CLCCR hotline with concerns about causing trouble if they cast a ballot.

"How widespread that (was), I can't really say, but we, at least, heard from a few people and I've done this long enough to know when you get a few calls, there are many more people who didn't call," Vaughn said. "They just stayed home."

Intimidation incidents rising on Election Day

Along with Indiana voters asking for the location of their polling place and what they should do if the poll book does not have them listed as a registered voter, Gandhi said the election protection hotline also received calls about voter intimidation and aggressive electioneering at some polling places.

Reports of intimidation included Hamilton County, where a group of individuals were standing outside a polling place waving Make America Great Again flags and harassing voters, according to CLCCR and Vaughn.

Sweeney Bell said in Marion County, poll worker training was updated to include de-escalation techniques. The additional instruction was in response to the false rhetoric about insufficient election security and ineligible voting, she said.

"I have no worries about the security of the ballot," Sweeney Bell said. "I worry about the security of the poll workers."

That training appears to have helped defuse an incident at a Marion County polling place that is still being investigated and could result in criminal charges. According to Sweeney Bell and Vaughn, a man became belligerent and shouted profanities, after he was told he had to remove his Make America Great Again hat and turn his T-shirt, which identified a specific candidate, inside out. The man took off his shirt, revealing he was carrying two guns and a knife. The police were called and the poll workers were able to get the man through the voting process as quickly as possible so he left with harming anyone.

Sweeney Bell said a report detailing what happened is still being compiled. The Marion County Election Board is scheduled to meet Dec. 12, she said, and the members will talk about the incident.

"I don't think it's over," Sweeney Bell said.

In Clark County, Lynch said poll workers at one voting site were also able to defuse a situation on Election Day. Someone came to the polling place and wanted to sit and watch the machine that tabulates all the ballots. The workers at the site enlisted help from the clerk's office and the staff was able to mitigate the situation so the individual left and police did not have to be called, he said.

Vaughn said the misinformation and intimidation has gotten "exponentially worse" since 2016. Indiana's laws do not provide much protection or prevention of escalating situations, she said, noting the state allows people to electioneer within 50 feet of the polling place, one of the shortest distances in the country, and while the state permits voting sites to restrict weapons and post signs, the statute has no teeth, so officials can do little if anyone violates the restrictions.

"People (are) being very hostile to voters who they perceive to be making different choices from them," Vaughn said. "Hoosiers need to practice a lot more tolerance during election season than we have been. It just seems to be getting worse each presidential election year. We desperately need somebody to bring the temperature down."


Marilyn Odendahl wrote this article for The Indiana Citizen.


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As 2025 begins, there will be a record number of women serving in state legislatures nationwide.

More than 2,400 women will hold state legislative offices, representing more than 33%. Maine ranks ninth in the nation for statehouse gender parity with women holding 43% of seats.

Jean Sinzdak, associate director of the Center for American Women and Politics at Rutgers University, is pleased the trend is moving in the right direction.

"We need to see bigger jumps in terms of the numbers of women running and then getting elected in order to get closer to parity," Sinzdak pointed out. "We're certainly making progress but there's a ways to go."

Sinzdak explained when women run for office, they win, and it is good for democracy. She noted research shows women are more likely to build consensus among lawmakers and work across the aisle.

The election of Republican Kelly Ayotte as New Hampshire's next governor means a record 13 women will serve as a state chief executive next year, including Maine Gov. Janet Mills. Sinzdak argued the women serve as role models for other women to run for public office but cautioned recruitment efforts for women candidates are still lacking.

She acknowledged caregiving responsibilities often prevent women from running, along with the double standard they face from the public.

"Voters want them to be likeable as well as tough," Sinzdak observed. "Whereas for a lot of male candidates, they don't necessarily need to be likable they just need to be seen as being able to do the job."

Sinzdak emphasized women bring their unique life experiences to the job. In Maine, women lawmakers were instrumental in passing the state's new Paid Family and Medical Leave program and codifying reproductive freedoms into law. Still, the gains for women in statehouses nationwide come as Vice President Kamala Harris failed in her effort to become the first woman president.

Support for this reporting was provided by The Carnegie Corporation of New York.


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