Take a first look at Sunderland's state-of-the-art new coroner's court inside the City Hall

Chief coroner for England and Wales His Honour Judge Thomas Teague QC visited the new City Hall to declare the court complex open.Located on the first floor of the building on the former Vaux brewery site, it is the culmination of an almost 20-year vision for city coroner Derek Winter.

When he took over in 2003, the role of coroner was only part-time and there was no permanent home for the service in Sunderland.

Inquests were held at the city’s magistrates court where bereaved relatives were forced to share space with defendants.

"It was not the best venue for families,” recalled Derek.

There were also problems reserving court time: “We would think we had booked a court room and then on the day, we would turn up to find a bench of magistrates sitting there,” he said,

Efforts to make the inquest process less upsetting for families of the deceased saw the decision taken to stop holding hearings at the magistrates court and and various other locations across the city were tried in an effort to make the experience easier, including the civic centre’s ceremonies and committee rooms, and even The Place in Sunniside.

The Regus Centre at Doxford proved a suitable location, with different rooms available to rent depending on attendance - but it was expensive.

The Harold Shipman case led to the Coroners’ and Justice Act in 2009, which was implemented in 2013, and saw a move to place families at the heart of the inquest process as well as modernising the coroner’s service.

"There was a move for coroners to be ‘whole time’ as they put it,” said Derek, who gave up his role as a solicitor with city law firm Morton’s to devote himself to his public role full-time.

"There were a couple of inquiries and they were recommending a move to a national service.”

In the end, it was decided to leave responsibility for the coroner’s service with local authorities, but introduce a Chief Coroner to oversee standards nationwide. Derek has been deputy chief coroner since 2019.

Eventually, in 2010, the Sunderland coroner’s department moved into its own home at the city's Civic Centre, which it shared with the Registrar of Births, Deaths and Marriages.

Council bosses had accepted that the initial cost of creating a new court would be off-set by savings on the future cost of renting accommodation: “We said ‘If you spend the capital, it is a one-off payment’ and all the council members were very supportive,” said Derek.

But while the new base was an improvement, it was still far from ideal, having been created by converting part of the existing building, rather than being built from scratch.

The new court was still too small to accommodate lengthy jury hearings comfortably, a situation which was compounded by the Covid pandemic and the need to ensure families, jurors and representatives were able to maintain social distancing.

The last couple of years has even seen hearings held at Redhills in Durham.

“The civic centre was really good compared to what we had before but it was nothing like what we have now,” said Derek.

With support from the city council, he has been involved at every stage of the design and building process on the new court: “It is purpose-built,” he said.

"Each court room has cameras, the big court has three TV screens, the little court has one and both courts have document cameras linked to the screens.

"We can bring witnesses in on Teams if we need to – if we have got an expert witness in London, we don’t want to be paying expenses and travel when we can just put him on screen."

Case referrals can now be submitted through an on-line portal: “Previously, the coroner’s officer would have to have their phone in their hand and have to write it all down manually, “ said Derek.

"Now they come in through the portal and we have a death record for every referral.”

Integrated IT allows files to be shared between all parties, while jury members and the press have their own chairs with folding tables to take notes.

There are dedicated family and meeting rooms and even a special jury room complete with its own kitchen area in case of lengthy deliberations.

And the new base has two court rooms, one large enough to hold jury inquests, which will help to deal with the backlog of cases which has built up during the pandemic: “Now we can run courts back-to-back,” said Derek.

"If I am on with a big case with a jury in court one, one of my assistant coroners can be dealing with one of the less complicated inquests or carrying out pre-inquest reviews in the other court.

"And I am happy for other coroner areas to use the facilities, which will help to defer some of the costs.”

Derek’s team of coroner’s officers have their own office and each case will be dealt with by just one of them: “We are allocating an officer to look after each case from beginning to end, because that better meets the needs of families,” he said.

“It does not matter how it ends, whether it is a case where no further action is required or an inquest needs to be held, it will be the same officer who oversees the case throughout.”

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