Breaching Confidentiality Behind the Scenes

From the John Cooley archive · Originally titled Confidentiality

I have attended planning meetings where the agency funeral coordinator shared personal information about the deceased officer or family members that did not involve planning the funeral. It was just a comment they thought would be interesting for others to know, gossip. In reality there was no reason for anyone on the planning team to know. These comments tarnished the coordinator’s reputation for being a professional and protecting the deceased officer’s reputation or the family’s confidence in there personal information being kept private. There may be times when a funeral coordinator learns things about the deceased officer or their family members that needs to be kept confidential or private. It is not the funeral coordinator’s job to share personal information that has nothing do with the planning team’s responsibilities. If something involves a particular team member’s duties, inform them in private.

As an example, I had an officer killed in the line-of-duty and during our preparations to make the notification to his wife and children he was described as being a great husband and father. At the notification I, and the other members of the notification team, learned that he and his wife had been separated for several weeks and he had been living in an apartment. No one knew about this situation and it was not my responsibility to inform his co-workers. For me to go back and share this with the entire planning team would have been irresponsible.

Another officer had been killed in the line-of-duty and while preparing for the notification to his spouse I learned that he was being investigated by an outside agency for felony spousal abuse. Again, this had and impact on how I would do my job but not every member of the planning team needed to know immediately, definitely no need to learn of this situation from me.

Another officer whose son was killed in a traffic collision and I responded to provide support. At the scene I learned that the officer/father had just learned that his son was dead and that his son was gay. The son was supposed to be away at college but had returned to town to visit his lover and hadn’t informed his father he was in town. Again, I needed to know in order to do my job best but this situation was not critical to most other members of the planning team doing their job. There was no reason for me, nor was it my responsibility, to talk about the situation to the officer’s co-workers.

Many agencies assign their special events coordinator to manage the funeral, be the funeral coordinator. They are often unaccustomed to dealing with personnel or medical issues that are protected by confidentiality or privacy laws or protocols. They are not accustomed to dealing with personal issues involving the deceased officer or family members or co-workers that may be learned during the planning process that should be kept private, as a matter of professionalism. A funeral coordinator must earn the confidence and respect of the deceased officer’s family, co-workers, and agency management. Any coordinator that openly shares personal information about the deceased officer or co-workers or family members is just spreading gossip and is not fulfilling the basic premise of being a funeral coordinator, to professionally serve the surviving family, agency, and agency members.

Every funeral coordinator, regardless if it is your regular assignment or if you are assigned when an incident occurs, has the responsibility to know and understand the parameters and limits of privacy and confidentiality. Personal, personnel and medical issues may be involved that people do not need to be privy too, even planning team members. Some information may be protected by law or agency protocol and others by a sense of personal decency and professionalism. Planning a funeral demands more then knowing how to park cars and seat people. It involves people and people issues. We have a responsibility to accept this and know how to work within the limits that may be imposed upon us. Our reputation precedes us as someone who can be or cannot be trusted. Once we lose that reputation, we can no longer adequately fulfill our responsibilities as a funeral coordinator.

By John Cooley | Policefunerals.com