By Dan Horn
Enquirer staff writer

A federal judge declared Thursday that top Hamilton County officials - from the coroner to county commissioners - share responsibility for policies that allowed a Cincinnati man to photograph bodies at the morgue.

U.S. District Judge S. Arthur Spiegel reached that conclusion after considering and rejecting a request from county officials to dismiss a lawsuit against them.

The lawsuit, filed by families whose loved ones were photographed, accuses county officials of negligence and claims they failed to prevent Thomas Condon from taking more than 300 inappropriate and illegal photos.

Condon was convicted of gross abuse of a corpse after acknowledging he took the photos four years ago as part of a personal art project, posing some of the bodies with toys, sea shells, fruit and other props.

He claims morgue employees, including Coroner Carl Parrott Jr., knew what he was doing.

But Parrott and others have said they gave him access to the morgue only to research a training video, not to take posed photos of bodies.

Spiegel's ruling Thursday clears the way for a jury trial in January, unless the decision is appealed or the case is settled first.

The judge refused to remove county officials from the suit because he said they would bear at least some responsibility for Condon's actions if a jury determines the families' allegations are true.

"Condon did not act in a vacuum. His activity took place in a facility managed by the defendants," the judge wrote in his 36-page decision.

"The county's leaders therefore share in the responsibility for the policies or lack thereof that resulted in an environment where Condon could prop and photograph bodies."

The county's lawyers said they may appeal the judge's decision to allow county officials to be sued as individuals as well as in their official capacities.

Attorney Louis Gilligan said county commissioners, in particular, should not be held individually liable for activities in the morgue.

But lawyers for the families said morgue employees, including Parrott, were aware of Condon's interest in his art project and either knew or should have known what he was doing.

"There is plenty of personal involvement," said Al Gerhardstein, who represents the families.

He said county officials have tried to pin the blame for the photos on Condon and a morgue pathologist, Jonathan Tobias, to protect their own careers and interests.

"Tobias is a bad guy and Condon is a bad guy," Gerhardstein said. "But they aren't the only bad guys."

Tobias claims he did nothing wrong, but the lawsuit accuses him of giving Condon access to bodies and taking inappropriate death scene photographs. Tobias was convicted along with Condon of gross abuse of a corpse, but was later cleared on appeal.

Spiegel said a jury should decide whether Tobias' supervisors knew what Condon was doing. He noted that the evidence suggests Condon may have shown them art books with similar photos and may have discussed his interest in taking such photos with morgue employees.

"If found credible by a jury, (the evidence) could indicate that Parrott and his staff knew about the sort of photography Condon was interested in from the outset," Spiegel wrote.

E-mail dhorn@enquirer.com