The Hawaiian star. [volume] (Honolulu [Oahu]) 1893-1912, 1900-11-22
CRIMINAL CARELEssNEss.

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One would have thought that with
all the publicity and argument which
has been made with regard to burial
permits such cases as were reported in
last nights Star would have been i'm
possible Yet here are two cases, and
one cannot say how many more burials
have taken place without permits.
In one case a man was buried in Ma
l1iki cemetery and four days later the
matter was reported to the He1lth au-
thorities. In another case man was
buried in Nuuanu cemetery, and it was
not till six days after thet the Board
of Health was notified of the fact of
the death. How often this Xxi III of thing
has been done, no one can say, and 1t
would be difficult for any one 10 find out
unless the officials would tell, ani that
they are not likely 10 do.
At the beginning os last year it was
a common thing for the Board of
Health's mortuary report to appear
with any where from half a dozen to
dozen cases boldly stated cause of
death unknown" A strong campaign
AT that time a man would arrive at the
Board of Health and ask for a permit
for burial of so and so, died this morn
ing. what did he die OFF" would be
the next question, he didn't know Was
any doctor in attendance" No. WAS
the deceased hot?" If the answer was
yes the Board of Health official put
down fever, if he could not get any in
formation the cause of death went down
as unknown" And this kind of thing
went on for years in spite of strong
protests. The value of the mortuary
statistics published may be judged from
this
But this has been changed, we have
had during the past year and a half
many Investigations into death which
have occurred suddenly and the find
ings in some cases have resulted in
prosecution. But the desire to shuttle
bodies into the ground seems ingrained
and now the superintendent of the
cemeteries have taken hand, bury
bodies first and report the death after
wards when. it is impossible to give
more than guess at the cause of
death. A man might have been suffer-
ing from some dangerous contagious
disease and there would be no know
ledge of the fact until it had taken hold
of the community. We have suffered
too much from contagious diseases
to take any unnecessary risks in this
direction Whether they be taken by
Superintendents of cemeteries, by the
I,v+
officer of the Board of Health.
But not only have the Superintend-
ents of cemeteries been guilty of what
may be called criminal negligence, the
executive officer of the Board of Health
has acted in a most extraordinary man,
ner in issuing permit of burial for the
body of old man Silva the florist. as
the facts given at the inquest seem to
develop.
The death of Silva was unattended.
In fact the old man died alone. The
executive officer of the Board of Health
saw the body and issued burial certi-
ticate which was irregular in its form,
satisfying himself about the cause of
death upon private INJURY most care
lessly conducted, when the case certain
ly merited a judicial inquiry. The man
was buried and there would have been
an end it, if
The 'if'' in this case consisted in the
fact of three men, friends of Silva, who
attended to the body being put into the
coffin, dying suddenly within a few
hours of one another The symptoms
were similar and We're suspicious
enough to call for inquiry. Examina-
ton Of the house showed that there
were bottles of poisonous liquor on the
premises, and that the men had drunk
of it. Chemical analysis showed that
the poison was hellebore.
Now the evidence given at the in
quest begins to point to the fact that
the old man may himself have been
poisoned. Had an inquest on Silva's
body been held the chances are the lives
of the three men who died from drink
ing the stuff after his death would have
been saved. A grave responsibility
therefore rests upon the executive off,
Ger of the Board of Health, who issued
a permit for burial without making a
proper investigation, which by law he
should have called upon the coroner to
make. A
In this connection 1t may be we'll to
recall the deaths of a mysterious char
acter which occurred in, Palolo valley a