New Vanderburgh Co. Coroner sworn in
EVANSVILLE, Ind. (WFIE) - After being officially sworn in at the first of the year, former EPD Detective Bryan Underwood has taken the reigns as Vanderburgh County Coroner.
“25 and a half years with the police department, last six years I’ve been in the Detective’s Office, something clicked that, you know, I was about ready to retire with the police department,” said Underwood. “And it was open spot, so that’s why I decided to run.”
Trading in the badge for some scrubs, Bryan Underwood has taken over for Steve Lockyear as your new Vanderburgh County Coroner.
After being sworn in, Underwood assumed his new position, albeit a bit different from his now former life of police and detective work, and not necessarily something he had always dreamed of doing.
“Unfortunately, I lost my wife in ‘22 to cancer,” Underwood said. “I’ve always been in the ‘helping people’ job, and I thought, ‘What’s a better way to keep doing this and to help people that’s dealt with things that I’ve dealt with?’”
Amid the mounds of paperwork and new login credentials, it seems like a good fit, particularly when it comes to those “transferable skills.”
“I’m not one of those that likes to sit behind a desk, so I’ll still go out on runs,” he said. “I did this morning. I still enjoy getting out and still doing things in the field. So, yeah, I think that coming from the police department and doing what I did there to coming here, it all ties in.”
Looking at the numbers from previous years for things like suicides and overdoses, Underwood says they’re pretty consistent.
While it’s objectively a good thing that they aren’t going up, he says he’d like to see them drop. With that, Underwood is bringing a few ideas into his new role.
“One of the big things I really would like to do is get into the schools,” said Underwood. “Middle schools, high schools, just to get them on board with overdoses, the drugs, what that does not only to them if they’re the ones that overdose, or if their loved one overdoses. I think sometimes if you get that side of the whole death, I think sometimes that can change a few. If it can change anyone from attempting suicide or overdosing, that’s a great win.”
Underwood says they’re nearing the groundbreaking on a new building at the moment and with what Underwood calls a great staff in tow, he says he’s very optimistic about the direction the Coroner’s Office is heading.
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