Lakshmanan Sathyavagiswaran, MD
FRCP(C), FACP, FCAP
Dr. Lakshmanan is a medical graduate from Madras University India. He is a 30+ year veteran of the Los Angeles County Coroner's Office, and was appointed as Chief Medical Examiner-Coroner for Los Angeles County on February 18 1992 by the Board of Supervisors. The Board of supervisors of Los Angeles County on recommendation of the Chief executive officer also appointed him to the position of Director (Interim) on April 3, 2012 and also requested him to continue his duties as Chief Medical Examiner-Coroner. Dr. Lakshmanan retired on August 11, 2013. Dr. Lakshmanan was re-appointed by the Board of Supervisors on April 11th 2016 as Interim Chief Medical Examiner-Coroner for Los Angeles County through January 18th, 2017.
Dr. Lakshmanan as Professor of Medicine and Pathology at the Keck School of Medicine was requested to remain as a Consultant and Director of Operations to the Department of Medical Examiner-Coroner as a USC faculty on January 19th 2017 to maintain the continuity of Department of Medical Examiner -Coroner operations.
He is a Board Certified Physician in several specialties including Anatomic, Clinical & Forensic Pathology, Internal Medicine, Geriatric Medicine and Infectious Diseases. He is also certified in pathology by the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada. As a peace officer, he holds a specialized law enforcement executive certificate from the Commission on Peace Officers Standards and Training, State of California. Dr. Lakshmanan is a Professor of Pathology at Geffen School of Medicine UCLA (Voluntary) and has numerous publications to his credit.
The Department of Coroner handles one third of the deaths in Los Angeles County with a staff that includes forensic pathologists, investigators, criminalists, toxicologists and various other support staff. During his career at the Department of Coroner, Dr. Lakshmanan has responded to several disasters including the 1986 Cerritos air crash, 1991 LAX US Air crash, 1992 Los Angeles Riots, 1994 Northridge Earthquake, 2005 Glendale Metro-link multiple fatality train incident, 2008 Chatsworth Metro-link train accident and has personally handled/testified on several high profile cases. Moreover, while Dr. Lakshmanan was CME-C, the Department hosted the 39th Annual meeting of the National Association of Medical Examiners (NAME) in 2005 and published a textbook in Forensic Neuropathology in 2007. Of note, Dr. Lakshmanan was President of the NAME for calendar year 2010 and in 2011 he was Chairman of the Board of Directors for the same.
During his tenure as CME-C, Dr. Lakshmanan worked with organ procurement organizations (OPO) towards a zero denial policy by cooperating in the authorized removal and timely disposition of human organs and tissue from bodies of deceased persons, including victims of homicide, in accordance with law and accepted medical practice. The goal was to insure a balance between protecting the integrity of the Coroner's inquiry into an organ donor's cause and manner of death while increasing the supply of organs for potential recipients. This allowed for the OPO’s timely procurement of organs which are medically viable and supported a “win-win” situation for the potential recipient and the Medical Examiner-Coroner’s office by meeting the needs of the community as well as the criminal justice system.