Arguing that her father didn’t intend to kill himself when he lifted a gun to his head in 2007 and pulled the trigger, a woman asked a judge Tuesday to order a change to the cause listed on his death certificate from suicide to accidental.
But the state Crime Laboratory, which initially determined the cause of death, does not want to make such a change.
Jackie Rowe, a 59-year-old gun enthusiast, was merely joking with his wife when he lifted the gun from the dinner table and said, “I wonder if this is still loaded,” his daughter, Tiffany Hastings, said in Pulaski County Circuit Court.
He shot himself behind the ear a moment later, court records show.
“He was too proud a man to have suicide on his death certificate,” Hastings said. “It was an accident. He didn’t mean for it to happen.”
Hastings didn’t dispute that her father pulled the trigger, but she insisted he thought the gun - known to jam - wasn’t loaded.
Rowe had no reason to commit suicide, she said, noting that he was optimistic despite being deaf and partially paralyzed.
“If those two things didn’t stop him years ago, nothing was going to,” Hastings said.
The family does not stand to benefit, financially or otherwise, if Rowe’s cause of death is changed, she said, but the change is important for their peace of mind.
The Arkansas Department of Health, which administers death certificates, has said it would amend the cause of death if ordered by the court.
But officials with the Crime Lab argued against such a change Tuesday.
The legal definition for suicide may differ from the legal standard, said Frank Peretti, assistant medical examiner for the laboratory. But the state’s medical examiners are tasked with making medical assessments, he said.
Peretti said he deemed the death a suicide largely because Rowe, who was knowledgeable about guns, chose to hold the gun to his head and pull the trigger, an inherently risky act.
“It was a deliberate act,” Peretti said. “He deliberately picked up the gun. Even if he thought the gun wasn’t loaded, he put the gun to his head.”
Charles Kokes, chief medical examiner for the Crime Lab, said Rowe’s death was a suicide, even if he didn’t intend to kill himself.
“He knowingly and willingly performed a potentially lethal action that caused his death,” Kokes said.
While it is rare, a Pulaski County court has previously ordered the state to change a death certificate.
In June 2010, Pulaski County Circuit Judge Mary McGowan ordered the Health Department to change a Little Rock man’s death certificate to show his cause of death as “undetermined.”
Peretti had ruled that man’s cause of death as “acute combined alcohol and cocaine intoxication” after he was found dead in 2005 in a Little Rock median.
His father conceded that his son had an addictive personality and a history of using crack cocaine. But he disagreed with Peretti’s opinion that his son died after taking a lethal dose of cocaine and instead believed his son diedof heatstroke.
Pulaski County Circuit Judge Tim Fox, who heard arguments related to Rowe’s death certificate Tuesday, will rule after attorneys for both sides file briefs in the case.
Northwest Arkansas, Pages 8 on 09/29/2012