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Stiff Upper Lip

Walter Williams, 78, was in hospice care at his home in Holmes County, Miss. A family member called the coroner to say Williams had stopped breathing. Coroner Dexter Howard stopped by, took Williams’ pulse, and declared him dead — and then helped the mortician put him in a body bag and take him to a funeral home. As the men prepared to embalm Williams, they noticed movement in the body bag. They called for paramedics: Williams was alive. “I asked the coroner what happened,” said Holmes County Sheriff Willie March, “and the only thing he could say is that it’s a miracle.” Howard is not a doctor; coroners in Mississippi are elected to the position, and don’t even have to have medical training to be elected. (RC/CNN, WAPT Jackson) ...So the actual miracle is that it hasn’t happened before.