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Coroner: Allen County Seeing Record Number Of Suicides

By Maureen Mespell
May 18, 2012 Updated May 18, 2012 at 6:12 PM EDT

Allen County, IN (Indiana's NewsCenter) -- The Allen County Coroner's Office is on pace to investigate a record number of suicides.

By the end of May last year, it had investigated 11-suicides.

As of May 18th this year, there have been more than double that number.

Michael Burris, Coroner's Chief Investigator says, "And it's spanning across all ages, all races, and all sexes."

Burris says the number of suicide by hanging is going up as is the use of Helium.

There are books on the market that explain how a person can asphysiate himself using Helium and a plastic bag.

"When a person decides they're going to take their own life, there's nothing anyone can do to stop them," says Burris. "Nobody can be watched 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. There are so many methods to kill a human being. So if they have come to the conclusion that that's what they want to do, they are going to get it accomplished."

Despite suicide hotlines and the like, the Allen County Coroner's Office is dealing with more and more people who made a conscious decision to end their lives.



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