THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Saturday, December 3, 1994 TAG: 9412030291
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY MIKE MATHER, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: VIRGINIA BEACH LENGTH: Long : 122 lines
Dr. N. Turner Gray spent Thanksgiving with a corpse.
In 25 years as an assistant medical examiner, he's spent many holidays with many corpses.
In all, more than 3,800 bodies.
Heart attacks. Overdoses. Shotgun murders.
All for $50 a body.
Since 1969, Gray has seen men killed for pocket change. Babies beaten lifeless by their parents. Victims burned beyond recognition in fires.
Nothing surprises him anymore.
Except surprise parties. Especially the one at Tandom's Pine Tree Inn Friday, thanking the 59-year-old physician for doing a thankless job.
A stunned Gray accepted proclamations from the mayor, plaques from the Police Department and praise from 70 friends and colleagues at a luncheon honoring ``a legend'' among death investigators.
Sheriff Frank Drew deputized him, saying, ``I know he's never wanted to be a doctor and he's always wanted to be a law-enforcement officer.'' Drew called Gray to the podium. ``And since I'm the only one here who can do it, I am going to appoint you as a deputy sheriff.''
Gray, a pediatrician, slipped into the sometimes lurid, sometimes violent world of medical examination after a party in 1969.
A young officer named William Haden, now commander of the Police Department's detective bureau, told Gray that investigators were having a hard time getting physicians to come to death scenes.
``The more he talked, the more it interested me,'' Gray said. He applied for an assistant medical examiner's position and was accepted as one of several physicians in Hampton Roads who help the state medical examiner.
His first case was an execution-style slaying in which the body was dumped in front of an elementary school.
``After that, it just snowballed,'' he said.
An average of three times a week, Gray is called to investigate suspicious deaths. Most turn out to be natural, or suicides.
About 25 times a year in Virginia Beach, it's murder. That's when the doctor turns detective. Bodies yield clues, and it's Gray's job to find them.
``Short of Miss Marple, there isn't anyone better,'' Haden said. ``He has a keen eye and is naturally very curious.''
More than once, his keen eye caught something detectives hadn't noticed.
Haden remembers Gray calling him into a hospital examining room after Gray found something noteworthy on the body of a person believed to have died naturally.
``I thought, `Oh, great, what did we miss?' '' Haden said. ``We walk back into the room and Turner says, `Look at this. The guy's got six toes on one foot.' Sure enough, he did.''
Once, a forensic technician found a palm print on the wall above a bathtub. In the tub was a body. The palm print was a promising lead for investigators with scarce clues.
``But it was my damn palm print,'' Gray said.
Gray isn't the only assistant medical examiner in Virginia Beach, but he gets so many cases, it seems that he is.
``Most cities this size have several assistant medical examiners, but in this city, he is really the only active assistant medical examiner,'' said Dr. John Krueger, a pathologist and assistant medical examiner, and a longtime friend of Gray's. ``The only time I get called is when he is out of town. He does probably 95 percent of the work, because he likes it, not because someone has dumped it on him.''
Born in Richmond, Gray grew up in Gloucester. He graduated from Randolph-Macon College in 1958 with a chemistry degree and four years later, graduated from the Medical College of Virginia.
In 1965, Gray finished his residency and convinced a classmate, Bob Mosby, to move to Virginia Beach to open a pediatric practice with him.
But when Mosby came the Navy drafted Gray.
He served as a Navy doctor in Rhode Island, and in 1968, Gray returned to join Mosby in a practice on Birdneck Road. Their only contract was a handshake.
Mosby often watches with anticipation when the office phone rings for Gray.
``He disappears every now and then from the office,'' Mosby said. ``I turn around and wonder where he is. When he gets an exciting call and the police need him, he's gone.''
For many years, Gray also disappeared behind the wheel of a tractor-trailer. For fun, Gray hauled cargo in a friend's 18-wheeler from Hampton Roads to places as far away as Spokane, Wash.
Once, traveling with his family on vacation, Gray befriended a truck driver through a conversation on a CB radio. They met at a truck stop and the trucker let Gray drive the rig for 100 miles while Gray's wife followed.
In the mid 1980s, Gray's busy schedule led to fewer long hauls. But his personal truck, an oversized, rumbling, diesel-burning Chevrolet Suburban, keeps him in touch with his ``trucking roots,'' he said.
His police contacts, which began with that first party conversation, have spread. The self-described ``frustrated investigator,'' spends nearly as much time with police as he does with his patients, many of whom are the children of police officers.
Gray lectures at the Virginia Beach Police Academy and has been a Rescue Squad adviser for as long as he's been a medical examiner.
``I still enjoy rolling out of bed at 2 a.m.,'' Gray said at the luncheon. ``I have to admit though, it isn't as easy as it used to be.''
He thanked his wife, Sylvia, and his 30-year-old son, Turner Jr., for their support. His 34-year-old daughter, Lynne, was home tending one of Gray's two grandchildren.
The only thing that shocks Gray is ``that I still enjoy doing this,'' he said. ``No two cases are alike. There is something unique about each of them. I just enjoy going out and, in some small way, helping bring about justice.''
Detectives say he helps in more than small ways.
``He provides us with a lot of expertise on his own personal time either at his home or out with us,'' said former homicide supervisor Sgt. John VanderHeiden. ``He's definitely an asset, no question about that.''
For others, the commitment runs deeper. Gray is the Haden family's pediatrician, and godfather to one of police commander Haden's sons.
``He's been a wonderful friend to me, he has been a tremendous colleague and he has taken wonderful care of my children,'' Haden said. ``You can't ask for people like that, they don't make them anymore.'' ILLUSTRATION: Milestone for a medical examiner
[Color Photo by] JOSEPH JOHN KOTLOWSKI/Staff
Dr. N. Turner Gray, an assistant medical examiner, holds a needle
that he uses to take blood for testing from the hearts of bodies. He
also works as a pediatrician in Virginia Beach.
KEYWORDS: PROFILE MEDICAL EXAMINER by CNB