The Jefferson County Coroner’s Office was first established in 1780. By Kentucky statutes the Coroner’s Office was mandated to determine the cause and manner of deaths in legally proscribed “coroner’s cases.” The Jefferson County Coroner’s Office has been in constant operation since that time.

For the last thirty-six years, the coroners had been physicians. The previous coroner Dr. Richard Greathouse, a pediatrician served, for twenty-eight years, until Dr. Ronald Holmes took office in January of 2003. 

Dr. Holmes is a criminologist and a professor of criminal justice at University of Louisville. His philosophy is that the Coroner’s office is a law enforcement agency. The mission reflects his philosophy that his deputies are death investigators with the primary goals of determining the cause and manner of death.