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American Autopsy
A revealing history of covering up the true causes of deaths of BIPOC in custody—from the forensic pathologist whose work changed the course of the George Floyd, Eric Garner, and Michael Brown cases
Dr. Michael Baden has been involved in some of the most high-profile civil rights and police brutality cases in US history, from the government’s 1976 re-investigation of the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr., to the 2014 death of Michael Brown, whose case sparked the initial Ferguson protests that grew into the Black Lives Matter movement.
The playbook hasn’t changed since 1979, when Dr. Baden was demoted from his job as New York City’s Chief Medical Examiner after ruling that the death of a Black man in police custody was a homicide.
So in 2020 when the Floyd family, wary of the same system that oversaw George Floyd’s death, needed a second opinion—Dr. Baden is who they called.
In these pages, Dr. Baden chronicles his six decades on the front lines of the fight for accountability within the legal system—including the long history of medical examiners of using a controversial syndrome called excited delirium (a term that shows up in the pathology report for George Floyd) to explain away the deaths of BIPOC restrained by police.
In the process, he brings to life the political issues that go on in the wake of often unrecorded fatal police encounters and the standoff between law enforcement and those they are sworn to protect.
Full of behind-the-scenes drama and surprising revelations, American Autopsy is an invigorating—and enraging—read that is both timely and crucial for this turning point in our nation’s history.
Dr. Michael Baden has been involved in some of the most high-profile civil rights and police brutality cases in US history, from the government’s 1976 re-investigation of the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr., to the 2014 death of Michael Brown, whose case sparked the initial Ferguson protests that grew into the Black Lives Matter movement.
The playbook hasn’t changed since 1979, when Dr. Baden was demoted from his job as New York City’s Chief Medical Examiner after ruling that the death of a Black man in police custody was a homicide.
So in 2020 when the Floyd family, wary of the same system that oversaw George Floyd’s death, needed a second opinion—Dr. Baden is who they called.
In these pages, Dr. Baden chronicles his six decades on the front lines of the fight for accountability within the legal system—including the long history of medical examiners of using a controversial syndrome called excited delirium (a term that shows up in the pathology report for George Floyd) to explain away the deaths of BIPOC restrained by police.
In the process, he brings to life the political issues that go on in the wake of often unrecorded fatal police encounters and the standoff between law enforcement and those they are sworn to protect.
Full of behind-the-scenes drama and surprising revelations, American Autopsy is an invigorating—and enraging—read that is both timely and crucial for this turning point in our nation’s history.
320 pages, Hardcover
Published January 17, 2023
27 people are currently reading
459 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 22 of 22 reviews
June 26, 2023
I've read a number of "working with the dead" books by coroners, forensic anthropologists, pathologists, human rights advocates. American Autopsy by Michael Baden is an important addition to this volume of work. Autopsies, like pretty much everything else in the U.S. are politicized. Baden explains in his afterword, "We are at a pivotal moment in US history. I believe it's necessary to help the public understand how the criminal justice system really works—how prosecutors, medical examiners, and police sometimes work together to protect cops involved in fatal shootings or restraint deaths."
He describes case after case that he's worked on that have left him seeing that racial bias in the justice system is systematic, not merely the work of "bad cops." Not all cops are bad cops, but bad cops are protected in ways that allow them to escape responsibility for their violence, particularly against people of color.
He argues that some commonly cited causes of death—for example, psychosis with exhaustion and excited delirium—simply aren't valid medical terms. Too often death by positional asphyxia, as was the case with George Floyd, is instead ruled a heart attack exacerbated by drug use.
Given Baden's careful documentation and detailing, reading this book is rough going—but it's essential going. The U.S. has no system for tracking deaths during arrest and in custody. Law enforcement organizations can choose to provide such information to the Department of Justice, but there is no requirement that they do so. Public attention—in the form of the BLM movement, a slowly rising number of murder convictions of police, and civil suits against cities and states—is being drawn to the extent of law enforcement's racialized violence, but change won't come until this violence is seen as systematic and addressed as such.
I received a free electronic review copy of this title from the publisher via Edelweiss; the opinions are my own.
He describes case after case that he's worked on that have left him seeing that racial bias in the justice system is systematic, not merely the work of "bad cops." Not all cops are bad cops, but bad cops are protected in ways that allow them to escape responsibility for their violence, particularly against people of color.
He argues that some commonly cited causes of death—for example, psychosis with exhaustion and excited delirium—simply aren't valid medical terms. Too often death by positional asphyxia, as was the case with George Floyd, is instead ruled a heart attack exacerbated by drug use.
Given Baden's careful documentation and detailing, reading this book is rough going—but it's essential going. The U.S. has no system for tracking deaths during arrest and in custody. Law enforcement organizations can choose to provide such information to the Department of Justice, but there is no requirement that they do so. Public attention—in the form of the BLM movement, a slowly rising number of murder convictions of police, and civil suits against cities and states—is being drawn to the extent of law enforcement's racialized violence, but change won't come until this violence is seen as systematic and addressed as such.
I received a free electronic review copy of this title from the publisher via Edelweiss; the opinions are my own.
January 12, 2023
In my ever-growing (and quite unintentional) research into the endless failings of the criminal justice system, I had never considered autopsies to be a major source of fraud. Or even of any real interest. How naïve. Dr Michael Baden sets this straight in American Autopsy, based on his nearly 70 years in the business. Autopsies are politicized, just like everything else in criminal justice.
Baden seems to have been called in on pretty much every famous case there has been in this era, from President Kennedy to Martin Luther King Jr. to Attica to OJ Simpson to Eric Garner to George Floyd to mafia dons and some 20,000 others we should be considered lucky not to have to know about. What sets him apart from the numerous other medical examiners and coroners in the USA is his total faith in science. He consistently refuses to play the game of primarily being on the police and prosecutor team, preferring to let science show what actually caused death.
This has gotten him into endless trouble: “I’d been demoted, fired, mocked and denounced for telling the truth about the deaths of Black and brown victims.” But he has made his reputation soar among civil rights lawyers and the bereaved, who suddenly lose loved ones to “natural causes” or bogus diseases after what should have been a simple traffic stop. As Baden fired back at New York Mayor Ed Koch years after Koch demoted and fired him, “They don’t teach us politics in medical school.” It seems New York mayors nearly always get disenchanted with their medical examiners. The pressure from the police commissioner and the district attorneys is evidently unbearable. Politics before truth, every time, it seems.
This is far from Baden’s first book or public exposure. He has had an HBO show on autopsies for 12 years and numerous book titles. His first wife founded Odyssey House, which blossomed into an international (non methadone) chain of treatment centers for the addicted, and his second (current) wife is a star attorney in civil rights issues. So one way or another Baden has been in the spotlight, since the late 1950s. He has much knowledge to impart, and this book weaves that knowledge with what he learned about life as he approaches 90. He’s still at it, too. All of it.
Throughout his career, he kept coming up against bogus causes of death. His “colleagues” are forever inventing new diseases to exonerate police and baffle the courts. The first one he encountered is called psychosis with exhaustion. This supposedly terminal illness occurs in Black, mostly young, males, who encounter arrest. They go crazy, develop super-human strength and suddenly die without the police touching them. Or, “police must use extreme force to subdue them.” Either way, their death in custody is never the fault of the police. It was used in court on a regular basis to claim the severe beatings inflicted by police were not the cause of death.
Baden points out that no such disease exists. It is not cataloged anywhere. It is pure fiction. But it is so technical and complex sounding that judges never challenge it. Nor jurors. Even though neither has ever heard of it. If the coroner says is it was psychosis with exhaustion, that stops the conversation right there.
As the shine wore off and criticism of it rose, it was replaced by a newer version, called excited delirium. Same deal. Baden calls them (far too politely) junk science. But they have successfully prevented punishment in literally thousands of unnecessary deaths at the hands, truncheons and guns of police.
He analyzes it as simply “an invented syndrome to protect police.” They “occur” thousands of times in police matters, but never seem to occur outside contact with cops. What could the cure be then, one might want to ask.
Incredibly, it was not until the 14th of June, 2021 that the American Medical Association finally spoke up and declared excited delirium “a racist creation to justify excessive use of force.” It was, Baden says, medical racism. Doctors were complicit with corrupt police.
Another totally racist non-disease is sickle-cell trait. This one really is confined to Blacks. It is the genetic cost of having resistance to malaria. It never actually causes death – except in death certificates after police beatings. Again, in their ignorance, courts accept this as the cause of death, exonerating police.
There are other excuses. Medical examiners will claim any amount of any drugs found in the blood brought on death, rather than obvious signs of beating and choking. Heart attacks, asthma attacks, Benadryl, common cold medicines – anything but what the evidence clearly shows. It was and is up to the Michael Badens of the world to say no. He has to say it a lot. The book is collection of these stories and courtroom dramas.
Even though it has been known for decades that pressing on a prone person’s back will shut off the oxygen supply and cause death, and even though police are routinely told not do that, the message has yet to reach police officers, and numerous cases, like George Floyd’s and Eric Garner’s show the way. “I can’t breathe” might have been made famous by Eric Garner, but it is on the record as the last words of far too many of those arrested, for decades. As Baden shows, speaking need not employ the lungs, so cops laughing at victims claiming they can’t breathe yet still talking is no joke. But cops just won’t give it up, and for the most part, they get away with it.
As Baden points out, we now know, thanks to universally available video cameras, that people of color with their hands up are routinely shot in the back. They are pummeled after being handcuffed and hogtied. And when they die, it is generally from natural causes, according to their death certificates. Baden gets called in for a second autopsy, and testifies as to the true cause of death. That this is ever needed is itself criminal. What to call it when it is so common?
It is freakishly and astoundingly commonplace in the USA. Between 1980 and 2018 alone, there have officially been 17,000 fatal encounters with police. Plus, there were another 18,000 deaths inaccurately listed “as another cause of death.” This according to a nationwide study by the University of Washington, published in Lancet. That’s 35,000 people executed for things like Driving While Black. Or being mentally ill. Or walking in the street.
The basic point of American Autopsy is integrity. Baden repeats (far too often) how the science speaks for itself, and nothing should be allowed to prevent the truth coming out. Unfortunately, because the criminal justice system is corrupt in so very many ways, Baden keeps facing uncomfortable choices, either making enemies of the local police and prosecutors by announcing the true cause of death, or going with the flow and never crossing the bright blue line. His consistent choice is truth.
It doesn’t always succeed, either. White juries routinely allow police to get off scot-free, regardless of autopsy results. Judges may not want to reopen closed cases. Monetary settlements may force plaintiffs to cease their efforts. Plaintiffs often can’t deal with the costs involved in clearing a loved one’s name.
There is also an unnecessary amount of variety in authority. The difference between pathologists and forensic pathologists is quite simple. Pathologists look to medicine to track down the cause of death. Forensic pathologists look for unnatural causes, such as bullets, choking, broken bones and organs, and poisons. In other words, the homicides, accidents, suicides and overdoses that make up eight percent of deaths in the USA. A medical examiner has to be proficient in both disciplines. But both exist and provide greater or lesser service.
The medical examiner community is tiny. There are fewer than 500 of them (and Baden created their professional association so they could keep up with each other and developments). Everywhere he is invited, he finds he knows the local examiner, from school or work.
There is also the coroner community, which while called on to perform similar duties, is not necessarily equipped to do so. In many jurisdictions, he says, coroners are elected and need not have any medical training at all. It is a political position, which means it automatically starts out on the wrong foot. From there, corruption is just a baby step away, and incompetence is an ever-present potential stumbling block.
And finally, there is no federal force or structure regulating them. Coroners are elected at the county level. Baden was for many years the chief medical examiner for the City of New York. The police sometimes have their own medical examiners. It is not quite random chaos. But influencers influence. Pressure abounds. Justice does not get served. People die. Murderers go free.
Baden has an interesting style – of writing. He will describe the subject of a chapter, and then step back through history to describe a similar case, often in the same geographic area and situation. He will often have been at the center of the other case himself. He wraps up that story and returns to the case at hand, which readers will have forgotten about because the lookback was so engrossing.
Then every so often, he plunges into his own family trials and tribulations, recognizing his failures (his first marriage, and ironically, his most promising child’s death from drug addiction), and also rejoicing in his successes (all three of his surviving children have become medical doctors). His personal passion for his work, and how he got into it, shines through it all. He was always attracted to it, loves doing it still, can’t wait to do another, and is recognized for his superior proficiency at it.
His life is crazy hectic. He will get a call and catch a plane just hours later. He needs to act before the body is cremated, buried or even just washed. It could take him a day or a week. Nicole Simpson’s body was washed, preventing Baden from determining if any of the blood on her back was not hers. At the Attica prison riots, he had to go and find the bodies, which had been distributed to numerous funeral homes in the region. While the police claimed prisoners had slit the throats of their hostages, the autopsies showed no slit throats, but gunshot wounds from attacking police. It was “friendly” fire that killed them, not inmates, despite massive disinformation campaign from state police.
Or he might get a call to do an autopsy 20 years after the fact, as happened with Medgar Evers. The coffin was well sealed, the body well embalmed, and Baden was able to do a proper autopsy that was key to finally convicting his KKK assassin, Byron De La Beckwith, who was acquitted several times previously.
It all makes for a very fast read, filled with familiar stories in the news and in history, behind the scenes machinations, and one solid and competent voice fighting the good fight. It’s a behind-the-scenes look that readers would never even imagine.
David Wineberg
Baden seems to have been called in on pretty much every famous case there has been in this era, from President Kennedy to Martin Luther King Jr. to Attica to OJ Simpson to Eric Garner to George Floyd to mafia dons and some 20,000 others we should be considered lucky not to have to know about. What sets him apart from the numerous other medical examiners and coroners in the USA is his total faith in science. He consistently refuses to play the game of primarily being on the police and prosecutor team, preferring to let science show what actually caused death.
This has gotten him into endless trouble: “I’d been demoted, fired, mocked and denounced for telling the truth about the deaths of Black and brown victims.” But he has made his reputation soar among civil rights lawyers and the bereaved, who suddenly lose loved ones to “natural causes” or bogus diseases after what should have been a simple traffic stop. As Baden fired back at New York Mayor Ed Koch years after Koch demoted and fired him, “They don’t teach us politics in medical school.” It seems New York mayors nearly always get disenchanted with their medical examiners. The pressure from the police commissioner and the district attorneys is evidently unbearable. Politics before truth, every time, it seems.
This is far from Baden’s first book or public exposure. He has had an HBO show on autopsies for 12 years and numerous book titles. His first wife founded Odyssey House, which blossomed into an international (non methadone) chain of treatment centers for the addicted, and his second (current) wife is a star attorney in civil rights issues. So one way or another Baden has been in the spotlight, since the late 1950s. He has much knowledge to impart, and this book weaves that knowledge with what he learned about life as he approaches 90. He’s still at it, too. All of it.
Throughout his career, he kept coming up against bogus causes of death. His “colleagues” are forever inventing new diseases to exonerate police and baffle the courts. The first one he encountered is called psychosis with exhaustion. This supposedly terminal illness occurs in Black, mostly young, males, who encounter arrest. They go crazy, develop super-human strength and suddenly die without the police touching them. Or, “police must use extreme force to subdue them.” Either way, their death in custody is never the fault of the police. It was used in court on a regular basis to claim the severe beatings inflicted by police were not the cause of death.
Baden points out that no such disease exists. It is not cataloged anywhere. It is pure fiction. But it is so technical and complex sounding that judges never challenge it. Nor jurors. Even though neither has ever heard of it. If the coroner says is it was psychosis with exhaustion, that stops the conversation right there.
As the shine wore off and criticism of it rose, it was replaced by a newer version, called excited delirium. Same deal. Baden calls them (far too politely) junk science. But they have successfully prevented punishment in literally thousands of unnecessary deaths at the hands, truncheons and guns of police.
He analyzes it as simply “an invented syndrome to protect police.” They “occur” thousands of times in police matters, but never seem to occur outside contact with cops. What could the cure be then, one might want to ask.
Incredibly, it was not until the 14th of June, 2021 that the American Medical Association finally spoke up and declared excited delirium “a racist creation to justify excessive use of force.” It was, Baden says, medical racism. Doctors were complicit with corrupt police.
Another totally racist non-disease is sickle-cell trait. This one really is confined to Blacks. It is the genetic cost of having resistance to malaria. It never actually causes death – except in death certificates after police beatings. Again, in their ignorance, courts accept this as the cause of death, exonerating police.
There are other excuses. Medical examiners will claim any amount of any drugs found in the blood brought on death, rather than obvious signs of beating and choking. Heart attacks, asthma attacks, Benadryl, common cold medicines – anything but what the evidence clearly shows. It was and is up to the Michael Badens of the world to say no. He has to say it a lot. The book is collection of these stories and courtroom dramas.
Even though it has been known for decades that pressing on a prone person’s back will shut off the oxygen supply and cause death, and even though police are routinely told not do that, the message has yet to reach police officers, and numerous cases, like George Floyd’s and Eric Garner’s show the way. “I can’t breathe” might have been made famous by Eric Garner, but it is on the record as the last words of far too many of those arrested, for decades. As Baden shows, speaking need not employ the lungs, so cops laughing at victims claiming they can’t breathe yet still talking is no joke. But cops just won’t give it up, and for the most part, they get away with it.
As Baden points out, we now know, thanks to universally available video cameras, that people of color with their hands up are routinely shot in the back. They are pummeled after being handcuffed and hogtied. And when they die, it is generally from natural causes, according to their death certificates. Baden gets called in for a second autopsy, and testifies as to the true cause of death. That this is ever needed is itself criminal. What to call it when it is so common?
It is freakishly and astoundingly commonplace in the USA. Between 1980 and 2018 alone, there have officially been 17,000 fatal encounters with police. Plus, there were another 18,000 deaths inaccurately listed “as another cause of death.” This according to a nationwide study by the University of Washington, published in Lancet. That’s 35,000 people executed for things like Driving While Black. Or being mentally ill. Or walking in the street.
The basic point of American Autopsy is integrity. Baden repeats (far too often) how the science speaks for itself, and nothing should be allowed to prevent the truth coming out. Unfortunately, because the criminal justice system is corrupt in so very many ways, Baden keeps facing uncomfortable choices, either making enemies of the local police and prosecutors by announcing the true cause of death, or going with the flow and never crossing the bright blue line. His consistent choice is truth.
It doesn’t always succeed, either. White juries routinely allow police to get off scot-free, regardless of autopsy results. Judges may not want to reopen closed cases. Monetary settlements may force plaintiffs to cease their efforts. Plaintiffs often can’t deal with the costs involved in clearing a loved one’s name.
There is also an unnecessary amount of variety in authority. The difference between pathologists and forensic pathologists is quite simple. Pathologists look to medicine to track down the cause of death. Forensic pathologists look for unnatural causes, such as bullets, choking, broken bones and organs, and poisons. In other words, the homicides, accidents, suicides and overdoses that make up eight percent of deaths in the USA. A medical examiner has to be proficient in both disciplines. But both exist and provide greater or lesser service.
The medical examiner community is tiny. There are fewer than 500 of them (and Baden created their professional association so they could keep up with each other and developments). Everywhere he is invited, he finds he knows the local examiner, from school or work.
There is also the coroner community, which while called on to perform similar duties, is not necessarily equipped to do so. In many jurisdictions, he says, coroners are elected and need not have any medical training at all. It is a political position, which means it automatically starts out on the wrong foot. From there, corruption is just a baby step away, and incompetence is an ever-present potential stumbling block.
And finally, there is no federal force or structure regulating them. Coroners are elected at the county level. Baden was for many years the chief medical examiner for the City of New York. The police sometimes have their own medical examiners. It is not quite random chaos. But influencers influence. Pressure abounds. Justice does not get served. People die. Murderers go free.
Baden has an interesting style – of writing. He will describe the subject of a chapter, and then step back through history to describe a similar case, often in the same geographic area and situation. He will often have been at the center of the other case himself. He wraps up that story and returns to the case at hand, which readers will have forgotten about because the lookback was so engrossing.
Then every so often, he plunges into his own family trials and tribulations, recognizing his failures (his first marriage, and ironically, his most promising child’s death from drug addiction), and also rejoicing in his successes (all three of his surviving children have become medical doctors). His personal passion for his work, and how he got into it, shines through it all. He was always attracted to it, loves doing it still, can’t wait to do another, and is recognized for his superior proficiency at it.
His life is crazy hectic. He will get a call and catch a plane just hours later. He needs to act before the body is cremated, buried or even just washed. It could take him a day or a week. Nicole Simpson’s body was washed, preventing Baden from determining if any of the blood on her back was not hers. At the Attica prison riots, he had to go and find the bodies, which had been distributed to numerous funeral homes in the region. While the police claimed prisoners had slit the throats of their hostages, the autopsies showed no slit throats, but gunshot wounds from attacking police. It was “friendly” fire that killed them, not inmates, despite massive disinformation campaign from state police.
Or he might get a call to do an autopsy 20 years after the fact, as happened with Medgar Evers. The coffin was well sealed, the body well embalmed, and Baden was able to do a proper autopsy that was key to finally convicting his KKK assassin, Byron De La Beckwith, who was acquitted several times previously.
It all makes for a very fast read, filled with familiar stories in the news and in history, behind the scenes machinations, and one solid and competent voice fighting the good fight. It’s a behind-the-scenes look that readers would never even imagine.
David Wineberg
January 30, 2023
Interesting and sometimes heartbreaking.
We rarely think of politics when we think of medicine even when it's forensic, there is something uncomfortable in thinking about it that way and this book offers a rather unflinching if very human approach to the question.
I particularly enjoyed the section where Baden details how the bogus diagnosis of excited delirium came to exist and to be popularized even though the "science" that was used to bring the idea forth has been thoroughly debunked. This book is well worth the read just for that part alone.
Baden is very critical of the buddy-buddy system between prosecution, law enforcement and medical examiner's office and the tendency these institutions tend to have to see themselves as colleagues but if you're critical of the police as an institution you might find yourself at odds with him because he is also a firm believer that police officers in general are good people doing a hard job.
While it's clear that Baden is someone with a lot of heart who made a lot of decisions in his life based on a strong moral code the writing in this book is sometimes a little dry and I was sometimes taken aback by it when he talked about things that should have been very poignant.
I received an eARC of this book from BenBella Books through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
We rarely think of politics when we think of medicine even when it's forensic, there is something uncomfortable in thinking about it that way and this book offers a rather unflinching if very human approach to the question.
I particularly enjoyed the section where Baden details how the bogus diagnosis of excited delirium came to exist and to be popularized even though the "science" that was used to bring the idea forth has been thoroughly debunked. This book is well worth the read just for that part alone.
Baden is very critical of the buddy-buddy system between prosecution, law enforcement and medical examiner's office and the tendency these institutions tend to have to see themselves as colleagues but if you're critical of the police as an institution you might find yourself at odds with him because he is also a firm believer that police officers in general are good people doing a hard job.
While it's clear that Baden is someone with a lot of heart who made a lot of decisions in his life based on a strong moral code the writing in this book is sometimes a little dry and I was sometimes taken aback by it when he talked about things that should have been very poignant.
I received an eARC of this book from BenBella Books through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
November 14, 2025
This was very well-written and a deep dive into topics of great interest to me. But I do feel like I have to deduct a star for the OJ chapters. As someone not very familiar with that case, he had me going “wait… so did he do it??” and reading up about it afterwards I realize he greatly misrepresented things and left out important details. Like the glove having been soaked in blood and frozen and unfrozen several times, thus causing shrinkage. That the evidence collection had some mistakes, but was not botched to the extent of making it all worthless, as even Baden’s colleague Henry Lee testified at the time was not true of the blood evidence - Baden doesn’t talk at all about Scheck’s whole blood contamination theory if I recall correctly, but focuses on other elements of the evidence collection; he also only mentions the theory that the glove was planted and not Scheck’s theory that blood was planted. For a book focused on police brutality cases and how medical examiners assist in covering them up, two whole chapters dedicated to the OJ trial is an odd choice, and his misrepresentation of the case could lead readers to doubt the saliency of the rest of the book, which would be a grave mistake, and it was a mistake on the part of Baden and his editors to allow for that possibility.
January 11, 2024
I enjoyed this chronicle of a man fighting for intellectual honesty in his field. Just as the book TY COBB by Charles Leerhsen attempts to expose decades of lies being told about the baseball great, so this book attempts to point out the use of non-existent medical diagnoses to explain-away deaths that happen while the deceased is in the custody of law enforcement. Of course, the videotaped death of George Floyd highlighted this problem like no death before it. But the practice has a long history. Dr. Baden has been fighting the problem since the 1960s.
Don't get me wrong. Deaths will always happen while suspects are in custody, and law enforcement is certainly not always to blame. Sometimes the deceased really did die of a drug overdose. But too often, coroners and pathologists--viewing themselves not as objective scientists, but as part of the law enforcement team--are easily pressured into ignoring the actual cause of death (strangulation, for example) and attributing suspicious deaths to "extreme agitation" and other things that are not even actual medical diagnoses. Often such a statement on a death certificate requires the doctor performing the autopsy to ignore obvious evidence of violent deaths at the hands of police.
I shared two quotes on Facebook.
UNEXPECTED SENTENCE OF THE DAY.
"Even after being in the ground for nine months, he was in very good shape. Settles had been well embalmed and his skin had not deteriorated much."
--AMERICAN AUTOPSY: ONE MEDICAL EXAMINER'S DECADES-LONG FIGHT FOR RACIAL JUSTICE IN A BROKEN LEGAL SYSTEM, by Michael Baden, M.D.
***
Thoughts during an autopsy of Medgar Evers, thirty years after his burial:
"I stood there for a moment in silence. I'm not sure why, but I thought about all the autopsies I had done over the years. I had seen the human body in so many different states of being and it was still beautiful to me. Each body is a miracle of nerves, blood vessels, millions of capillaries. Trillions of cells, all in their proper place ... an autopsy is a holy thing for me."
AMERICAN AUTOPSY: ONE MEDICAL EXAMINER'S DECADES-LONG FIGHT FOR RACIAL JUSTICE IN A BROKEN LEGAL SYSTEM, by Michael M. Baden, M.D.
Don't get me wrong. Deaths will always happen while suspects are in custody, and law enforcement is certainly not always to blame. Sometimes the deceased really did die of a drug overdose. But too often, coroners and pathologists--viewing themselves not as objective scientists, but as part of the law enforcement team--are easily pressured into ignoring the actual cause of death (strangulation, for example) and attributing suspicious deaths to "extreme agitation" and other things that are not even actual medical diagnoses. Often such a statement on a death certificate requires the doctor performing the autopsy to ignore obvious evidence of violent deaths at the hands of police.
I shared two quotes on Facebook.
UNEXPECTED SENTENCE OF THE DAY.
"Even after being in the ground for nine months, he was in very good shape. Settles had been well embalmed and his skin had not deteriorated much."
--AMERICAN AUTOPSY: ONE MEDICAL EXAMINER'S DECADES-LONG FIGHT FOR RACIAL JUSTICE IN A BROKEN LEGAL SYSTEM, by Michael Baden, M.D.
***
Thoughts during an autopsy of Medgar Evers, thirty years after his burial:
"I stood there for a moment in silence. I'm not sure why, but I thought about all the autopsies I had done over the years. I had seen the human body in so many different states of being and it was still beautiful to me. Each body is a miracle of nerves, blood vessels, millions of capillaries. Trillions of cells, all in their proper place ... an autopsy is a holy thing for me."
AMERICAN AUTOPSY: ONE MEDICAL EXAMINER'S DECADES-LONG FIGHT FOR RACIAL JUSTICE IN A BROKEN LEGAL SYSTEM, by Michael M. Baden, M.D.
March 30, 2025
Dead all along
5/5 -- a must read
The common refrain we hear in America is that the criminal legal system is "broken." But Dr. Michael Baden's book proves the exact opposite -- the system is working exactly as it was intended by allowing police to murder Black & Brown citizens with impunity.
Part autobiography, part remarkable accounting of a storied career, this was a compelling read that should be required for all Americans. A brief summary of the absurdity of the system in America:
Counties use either a coroner (voted in, non-physician) or a medical examiner (a physician trained in forensic pathology) to investigate non-natural deaths. Medical examiners, while far more qualified & utile, are few & very far between. As such, suspects killed by police often get junk science autopsies that blatantly protect the police despite obvious evidence proving their violence/restraints were the cause of death. This then insulates the police from investigation & conviction, as we have seen time & time again in the US. And instead of being independent & apolitical instruments of science, MEs are often coerced & "bought" by the police & district attorneys to prevent police accountability.
Enter Dr. Baden's incredible career. Known as an objective & brilliant forensic investigator, he has been consulted for decades in some of the most high profile cases in America: George Floyd, Eric Garner, OJ Simpson, & even the posthumous investigations of the assassinations of JFK & Medgar Evers.
Likes
+ A perfect blend of autobiography, science, & forensic accounts
+ A clear, no-nonsense look at the toxic criminal system in the US
+ Incredibly moving accounts of personal loss by police murders & cover-ups
+ A fantastic look at the antiquated coroner system that is still inexplicably used in the US
+ Larger than life celebrities are humanized, e.g. Johnnie Cochran (R.I.P.)
Dislikes
- N/A!
Summarily, this is a transformative look at a one of a kind career, physician/ME, & human. Dr. Baden's book belongs in the same echelon of social justice works as "Medical Apartheid" & "The New Jim Crow."
5/5 -- a must read
The common refrain we hear in America is that the criminal legal system is "broken." But Dr. Michael Baden's book proves the exact opposite -- the system is working exactly as it was intended by allowing police to murder Black & Brown citizens with impunity.
Part autobiography, part remarkable accounting of a storied career, this was a compelling read that should be required for all Americans. A brief summary of the absurdity of the system in America:
Counties use either a coroner (voted in, non-physician) or a medical examiner (a physician trained in forensic pathology) to investigate non-natural deaths. Medical examiners, while far more qualified & utile, are few & very far between. As such, suspects killed by police often get junk science autopsies that blatantly protect the police despite obvious evidence proving their violence/restraints were the cause of death. This then insulates the police from investigation & conviction, as we have seen time & time again in the US. And instead of being independent & apolitical instruments of science, MEs are often coerced & "bought" by the police & district attorneys to prevent police accountability.
Enter Dr. Baden's incredible career. Known as an objective & brilliant forensic investigator, he has been consulted for decades in some of the most high profile cases in America: George Floyd, Eric Garner, OJ Simpson, & even the posthumous investigations of the assassinations of JFK & Medgar Evers.
Likes
+ A perfect blend of autobiography, science, & forensic accounts
+ A clear, no-nonsense look at the toxic criminal system in the US
+ Incredibly moving accounts of personal loss by police murders & cover-ups
+ A fantastic look at the antiquated coroner system that is still inexplicably used in the US
+ Larger than life celebrities are humanized, e.g. Johnnie Cochran (R.I.P.)
Dislikes
- N/A!
Summarily, this is a transformative look at a one of a kind career, physician/ME, & human. Dr. Baden's book belongs in the same echelon of social justice works as "Medical Apartheid" & "The New Jim Crow."
April 25, 2023
Science first captured my attention in high school when we began studying DNA. I was intrigued by how our genes could be identified by looking at our parents' cross-sections. I spent a great deal of time working on Punnett squares to see how my DNA could compare to my parents'. I absolutely loved it.
I guess this is where my interest in forensics was derived. When I first heard of Dr. Baden's television show AUTOPSY, I was entranced. Again, I loved the science behind discovering how death had occurred. As the years passed, I watched all kinds of series' Forensic Files, Cold Case Files, etc. When I saw AMERICAN AUTOPSY, I knew this was a book I needed to read. Finding it was written by Dr. Baden made it even better.
Dr. Baden has had a fascinating career. The lives of the families he has helped by examining the bodies of their loved ones and discovering key evidence missed in earlier autopsies are incredible. He is not political. It is obvious he is all about the science of the human body and how it is affected by foreign objects. Dr. Baden's willingness to go against the normal political lines to protect law enforcement is commendable. He is a righteous man and should be applauded. The cases outlined in the book were not those of celebrities, but of everyday people who we now know the names of because of the brutality of their deaths at the hands of others. The manner in which these deaths are explained through science is well described so those without a scientific background can understand.
For those who are not enthusiastic about science, this might be a book that will intrigue you because of the timeliness of some of the civil rights cases outlined (Medgar Evers, Michael Brown, Trevon Martin, and George Floyd). I highly recommend this title.
I guess this is where my interest in forensics was derived. When I first heard of Dr. Baden's television show AUTOPSY, I was entranced. Again, I loved the science behind discovering how death had occurred. As the years passed, I watched all kinds of series' Forensic Files, Cold Case Files, etc. When I saw AMERICAN AUTOPSY, I knew this was a book I needed to read. Finding it was written by Dr. Baden made it even better.
Dr. Baden has had a fascinating career. The lives of the families he has helped by examining the bodies of their loved ones and discovering key evidence missed in earlier autopsies are incredible. He is not political. It is obvious he is all about the science of the human body and how it is affected by foreign objects. Dr. Baden's willingness to go against the normal political lines to protect law enforcement is commendable. He is a righteous man and should be applauded. The cases outlined in the book were not those of celebrities, but of everyday people who we now know the names of because of the brutality of their deaths at the hands of others. The manner in which these deaths are explained through science is well described so those without a scientific background can understand.
For those who are not enthusiastic about science, this might be a book that will intrigue you because of the timeliness of some of the civil rights cases outlined (Medgar Evers, Michael Brown, Trevon Martin, and George Floyd). I highly recommend this title.
September 30, 2023
While I was at CrimeCon this year in Orlando, I went to Dr. Baden’s session called American Autopsy. He spoke of his mission as a forensic pathologist to help in investigating BIPOC deaths at the hands of police. I immediately went and purchased his book, American Autopsy, and began reading it on my flights home.
This is an emotionally charged topic for a lot of people, on either side of the divide. The book is extremely well written and really just provides facts. It’s also a memoir as he recounts how he ended up where he is, one of about 500 forensic pathologists in the country, and how he chose to pursue the racial justice path.
Dr. Baden has done a lot of good in his life, believing that pathologists shouldn’t be political, should tell the facts as science shows them, and be transparent. He ran his office in that manner, and that rubbed a lot of politicians and prosecutors the wrong way. (He was demoted from Chief Medical Examiner by Mayor Koch for not “being a team player”. hmm.) Dr. Baden worked for the New York State Police and was tireless in his training on how chokeholds could kill, how forcing a suspect prone and putting pressure on the back could kill, and how people can actually talk when they can’t breathe. He often waived his fee to help families who needed him to perform second autopsies when their loved ones died in police custody. And he always speaks the facts. Even if the people in charge don’t want to hear or believe him.
This is really a thought-provoking book. Even if this isn’t normally your cup of tea, it’s a book that can give you a different perspective.
This is an emotionally charged topic for a lot of people, on either side of the divide. The book is extremely well written and really just provides facts. It’s also a memoir as he recounts how he ended up where he is, one of about 500 forensic pathologists in the country, and how he chose to pursue the racial justice path.
Dr. Baden has done a lot of good in his life, believing that pathologists shouldn’t be political, should tell the facts as science shows them, and be transparent. He ran his office in that manner, and that rubbed a lot of politicians and prosecutors the wrong way. (He was demoted from Chief Medical Examiner by Mayor Koch for not “being a team player”. hmm.) Dr. Baden worked for the New York State Police and was tireless in his training on how chokeholds could kill, how forcing a suspect prone and putting pressure on the back could kill, and how people can actually talk when they can’t breathe. He often waived his fee to help families who needed him to perform second autopsies when their loved ones died in police custody. And he always speaks the facts. Even if the people in charge don’t want to hear or believe him.
This is really a thought-provoking book. Even if this isn’t normally your cup of tea, it’s a book that can give you a different perspective.
September 14, 2023
This is a good book for anyone who think the police and prosecutors always have it right. This is a masterful book written by a eighty something man who isnt slowing down after over 50 years fallowing his bliss as a forensic pathologist . This man was one the coroners inquest and review for johm f kennedy and martin luther king. He wrote manuals and publlished articles. He presented at conferences and taught at lectures. He tried hard to bring things as a pathologist about mental ilnesss and addiction to light. He married and then eventally divorced snd remarried. He mourned his ex wife as he mogther of his children a collegue and a fiend when she passed away. He did his best to
discredit junk science. This is about the autopsies of some of the most famous vicrims of po.icve or racial violence in the last 50 years . This is about a man who started off as naivee believing the police and the prosecutors always got it right and that the pathologists are helping them get convictions on the bad guys and then realized something else entirely. I think everyone should read this book.
discredit junk science. This is about the autopsies of some of the most famous vicrims of po.icve or racial violence in the last 50 years . This is about a man who started off as naivee believing the police and the prosecutors always got it right and that the pathologists are helping them get convictions on the bad guys and then realized something else entirely. I think everyone should read this book.
March 13, 2025
This book was so interesting and also infuriating. It took a deep dive into high profile murders where racial injustice was served, and explained the scientific evidence the author (medical examiner) revealed from his autopsies and how prosecutors police, etc., sometimes changed the narrative to better fit their agenda. It was kind of uncomfortable to read , but he wraps it up with a lot of hopeful sentiments about how knowledge and pushing back through rallies, peaceful protesting, education about these cases can hopefully teach everyone how to be better in the future. i’m on like a forensic scientist kick right now, so this was really interesting. Coming off my last book about forensic science just leaning more heavily on the autopsy part of it is really interesting stuff and not overly scientific so if you don’t have any medical background you won’t have trouble understanding what the authors explaining he does a very good job of breaking it down in the layman terms
February 2, 2023
Another day, another non-fiction read about the American criminal justice system 🙃 thank you @benbellabooks for this #gifted copy
In American Autopsy (out now), Dr. Baden walks readers through his journey to becoming a medical examiner, his career, and many of the cases (some famous) he worked on. What I found most inspiring about this book is how Dr. Baden acknowledged his privilege and reiterated numerous times the pervasiveness of racism in the American criminal justice system. And he didn’t just say it, but he showed it by describing several cases he worked on.
Every time I read a book like American Autopsy, I get so angry. Like, how can people not see there’s something wrong with our system?! It’s infuriating. But I do feel better that professionals like Dr. Baden have spent decades advocating for justice in their work and trying to improve the CJ system.
If you haven’t read this one, I definitely recommend it!
In American Autopsy (out now), Dr. Baden walks readers through his journey to becoming a medical examiner, his career, and many of the cases (some famous) he worked on. What I found most inspiring about this book is how Dr. Baden acknowledged his privilege and reiterated numerous times the pervasiveness of racism in the American criminal justice system. And he didn’t just say it, but he showed it by describing several cases he worked on.
Every time I read a book like American Autopsy, I get so angry. Like, how can people not see there’s something wrong with our system?! It’s infuriating. But I do feel better that professionals like Dr. Baden have spent decades advocating for justice in their work and trying to improve the CJ system.
If you haven’t read this one, I definitely recommend it!
Read
February 2, 2023This book had me engaged from the very start and I ended up reading all of it in a day. Quite often people assume that the impacts of racism are not present in the medical system. Baden highlights and proves that often times it is present. The language in the book was strong and really highlighted the system in place between prosecution, law enforcement and medical examiner's office and how if you rock the boat you are deemed " not a team player" and a poor fit for the role. It is important that these systems are challenged as it helps to prevent compliancy which impacts the actual justice. I agree with his approach that forensic pathology should be about the evidence without any biases involved and more pathologists need to approach their work with this lense. I found the book to be very informative, it sparked discussions with my friends and it is a book I would absolutely read again.
Read
April 27, 2024Dr. Michael Baden has been involved in doing autopsies (often follow-up ones) on many famous bodies, from JFK to George Floyd. A fascinating life!
Here he tells about those experiences as well as many situations where medical examiners have diagnosed cause of death as fake conditions such as "agitated psychosis", helping exonerate police.
This book asks for regulations requiring higher (more scientific) standards in death investigations, consistent use of body cams by police, less racism in the police and justice systems, no more chokeholds used by police, and other straightforward needed reforms.
If you need help explaining why those reforms are needed, there are great examples in this book.
Here he tells about those experiences as well as many situations where medical examiners have diagnosed cause of death as fake conditions such as "agitated psychosis", helping exonerate police.
This book asks for regulations requiring higher (more scientific) standards in death investigations, consistent use of body cams by police, less racism in the police and justice systems, no more chokeholds used by police, and other straightforward needed reforms.
If you need help explaining why those reforms are needed, there are great examples in this book.
April 20, 2023
I just love books about forensics/forensic pathology and this didn’t fail. This is about one man’s career and love and highlights how important it is for the forensic pathologist and the person who determines the cause of death, injury to have a medical background. Also important to think outside the box and not believe everything law enforcement or other pathologists say. Follow the evidence. Follow the science. People always have an agenda, have biases be it political, racism, cultural, protective.
November 22, 2023
This was a fantastic read by an absolute expert in the field of medical examinations and forensics. I loved his honesty in how often science fails murdered Black Americans, how backwards our understanding of human body diversity is, and how far we have to go in the equitable analysis of crime, blame, and prosecution. Also, he is one of the most fair minded people I’ve heard when it comes to the need for massive police reform in this country. He isn’t completely ACAB, but he also lays out exactly what needs to happen to make the world a fairer place for everyone.
May 22, 2023
Dr. Baden is an incredible professional. There is no question that his life’s work is important and admirable. I have nothing but respect for the way he stood up against wrongs when it would be so much easier to go along. The system is broken and everyone deserves their life to be valued. The only reason for the 3 stars is that I didn’t find the book very readable. It came off repetitive and a little bit preachy for my taste.
February 8, 2023
Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC.
Great job on this book. I’ve always liked Dr. Baden and have watched shows with him and read other books. This one really delved into a lot. While I was not a huge fan of the political aspect of the book I did appreciate that it fit in and was appropriate.
Anything with Dr Baden is always bound to be good and enlightening.
Great job on this book. I’ve always liked Dr. Baden and have watched shows with him and read other books. This one really delved into a lot. While I was not a huge fan of the political aspect of the book I did appreciate that it fit in and was appropriate.
Anything with Dr Baden is always bound to be good and enlightening.
May 24, 2024
I bought this after seeing Dr. Baden speaking at Crime Con 2023 (can't wait for 2024!). He was charismatic and passionate about the topics in this book. The book is written well and easy to follow, not too deep in the scientific weeds. It covers how important it is for medical examiners to be separate from the police. It's really good, highly recommended.
February 7, 2026
Baden is hyper-focused on only the facts, which is the essence of the scientific method. We need more people making decisions on facts rather than a preconceived agenda.
Read this and you'll learn to question everything in America.
Read this and you'll learn to question everything in America.
March 19, 2025
While some of these things in this book I have a different opinion on, the book itself was very interesting and informative, these are the types I really like to read.
August 17, 2025
a little self indulgent.. no small shoes to fill
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