His Business Is Dead

When Vidal Herrera steps out of his white van emblazoned with “1-800-Autopsy” on the side, strangers often go up to him and say, “You’re weird.” Sometimes, when he is eating in a restaurant, supporters will approach him and ask for his autograph.

It seems making a living by assisting with autopsies or procuring tissue and organs for transplants draws a reaction. Now Herrera, an autopsy technician who owns and runs Autopsy/Post Services out of his La Crescenta home, plans to open a lab on a downtown stretch of Foothill Boulevard surrounded by restaurants, stores and repair shops.

But six months after the city Building and Safety Department gave him a permit to convert a restaurant into a lab at 7245 Foothill Blvd., officials realized they made a mistake.

When Herrera applied in February for a permit for an outdoor sign shaped like a toe tag, he learned he was in an area that had been rezoned five years ago to attract more restaurants and stores. Two months later, after Herrera had spent nearly $200,000 on improvements, inspectors slapped him with a stop-work order, saying the conversion permit wasn’t cleared by the city Planning Department.

“It’s been one nightmare after another,” Herrera said. “It’s put a dent on everything.”

Currently, Herrera is renting his space to TV and film producers looking to shoot morgue scenes. He outfitted the lab with imitation refrigeration units that look real, but whose doors open to reveal a brick wall.

Several business owners in the neighborhood seem torn about Herrera. They sympathize with his struggles as an independent businessman, but they dislike the fact that his lab lacks a back-door entrance for loading and unloading.

The building was selling for only $82,000 because it lacks ample rear access, Herrera said.

“If you have bodies going back and forth across the sidewalk, who would want to move next door?” asked Charlotte Leu, co-president of the Merchants Assn. of Sunland/Tujunga, who owns an art studio on nearby Commerce Avenue. “You wouldn’t want a coffee shop next to 1-800 Autopsy. It would be rather bizarre.”

Unpleasant Reminder of Human Mortality

Herrera believes few people would notice incoming bodies--which would average about three a week. Nondescript white vans would deliver patients in body bags covered with sheets and velvet blankets, he said, adding that each body can be unloaded in two minutes. Most of the procedures would be done at night.

Yet more than encountering NIMBYs, Herrera may have wounded the area’s small-town sense of pride, or perhaps reminded people of their mortality. Jeff Mivelaz, the third-generation owner of a hardware store that has been on Commerce Avenue for 50 years, said business has increased in the area in the past four years.

“Why did [Herrera] pick Tujunga?” Mivelaz said. “Personally, it’s no big deal, we’re all going to die one day. [But Herrera] kind of makes a joke of his autopsy place.”

Yet Herrera has found a solid ally in Barry Koven, who owns a motorcycle parts and service shop next door.

“As far as I’m concerned, it’s a doctor’s office,” Koven said about the lab.

Herrera became certified as an autopsy technician during his 14 years with the Los Angeles County Coroner’s office. Because there are no training schools or state licensing rules for autopsy technicians, they must serve as volunteer apprentices with the coroner or with businesses such as Herrera’s to become qualified, he said.

The College of American Pathologists must certify the lab’s “clean room,” where autopsies are performed, before Herrera can open.

Herrera estimates he has assisted with more than 18,000 autopsies in 27 years.

“Death sustains me,” said Herrera, 48, who is married and has two sons. “I make more money than I ever dreamed possible.”

He said he earns more than $100,000 assisting with about 900 procedures a year at hospitals and mortuaries. He charges $2,000 and up for many of his services, employing a technician and contracting with pathologists who must legally oversee and sign off on his work.

New Demand for Private Autopsies

Herrera said business is booming because he fills a niche.

In the years following World War II, about 50% of hospital deaths were routinely autopsied. Now the number is down to 5%, which Herrera attributes to the emergence of cost-cutting HMOs in recent decades.

As a consequence, fewer mortuaries and hospitals conduct autopsies on site, and they do so only during limited hours, he said. People whose relatives have died in hospitals, nursing homes or at home and who suspect the deaths have been misdiagnosed often request autopsies, Herrera said. Criminal defense attorneys and funeral directors also ask for them.

By operating around the clock, Herrera plans to offer groups a convenient place where they can harvest transplant tissues and organs.

Despite his success, he said his battle with the city has cost him about $50,000, including $20,000 in fees to the city and a private consultant to get a zoning exemption. The city will hold a public hearing in about two months, when merchants and residents can weigh in on Herrera’s venture. Officials will then decide whether to approve the project.

“That’s why you read about businesspeople leaving the city,” Herrera said. “Even if I win, I’m going to sue [the city]. I shouldn’t have to incur all this expense and this loss.”

If he wins, Herrera has big plans for the 2,400-square-foot storefront. He wants to put two upright coffins containing shelves in the front window to display a mail-order line he calls “Casket of Goodies,” including a brain-shaped gelatin mold, Dia de Los Muertos (Day of the Dead) snack boxes and syringe-shaped pens, all popular items during Halloween season, he said.

In another corner, he wants to set up a miniature museum to display antique autopsy equipment that he has collected over the years, including an embalming machine and a gut container, both made of white porcelain.

To attract community support, Herrera is trying to secure permission to sponsor a booth at the Old Town Street Fair along Commerce Avenue on Oct. 21, where he wants to sell ceramic jewelry boxes shaped like coffins.

“It would be an added flair to the street fair,” he said.