BALTIMORE — The Maryland Office of Chief Medical Examiner is experiencing an unprecedented backlog of autopsies. The delays mean families have to wait weeks to say goodbye to their loved ones who were murdered or overdosed.

“The bodies are piling up and decaying right in front of everyone’s eyes,” said Patrick Moran, President of AFSCME Council 3, which has members who are autopsy assistants and forensic investigators. “Bodies are decomposing, and that’s not the way to treat those that have lost their lives and families who are looking for closure.”

More than 200 bodies are awaiting autopsy. Moran said members of the union describe a gruesome scene at the agency in Baltimore, which is responsible for investigating violent or suspicious deaths, including all deaths unattended by a physician.

“It’s pretty vile, and it’s pretty unhealthy,” said Moran.

Running out of space, the Maryland Department of Health converted a parking garage downtown into a morgue until a permanent expansion could be built.

“The additional storage that has been provided allows adequate capacity decedents that may be awaiting autopsy as well as decedents who are completed and awaiting funeral homes,” said Dr. Jinlene Chan, Deputy Secretary of MDH, at a House subcommittee meeting last week.

Dr. Chan said the backlog has been rising for the last few weeks. It’s caused by high vacancy rates (17.2 percent in December) and increasing numbers of murders and drug overdoses, which are resource-intensive cases.

An MDH spokesperson said there is a nationwide shortage of qualified applicants.

Moran said it’d been a longstanding challenge to maintain adequate staffing.

As of December, three positions had been vacant for almost a year. Fire medical examiners have retired or resigned over the last two years, and three more are expected to retire soon.

“We need them to recruit more people to do the job. They need to look at what people need. The resources people need to do the job, the salary they need to do the job, and take action.

In a statement, MDH said they offer highly competitive salaries, and they are performing direct outreach to fill openings, dedicating a recruitment specialist specifically for OCME.

To assist with the growing workload, MDH added 21 new positions, including medical examiners, toxicologists, and support professionals.

In the meantime, FEMA is supplying two pathologists and two pathology assistants to provide additional support to OCME beginning this week.

The delays ultimately impact the families who grieve the loss of a loved one.

“The families are anxious anyway because they have lost someone dear to them, so it adds onto the anxiety level,” said Erich W. March, the VP and CEO of March Funeral Homes.

March said the OCME used to take two days to perform an autopsy. Now it’s taking as long as two weeks from the date of death, forcing families to wait to say their final goodbyes.

“It makes it difficult for the family plans their memorial service or tribute because they don’t have a real set date as to when the preparations can be completed,” said March.

The OCME is accredited by the National Association of Medical Examiners or NAME. To maintain that status, there are specific standards they have to meet, and these issues are causing violations.

NAME’s standard is that no autopsy physician should be required to perform more than 325 autopsies per year. In fiscal 2021, OCME reported its highest ratio with 390 autopsies performed per ME, significantly surpassing the phase II standard.

In the FY23 MDH budget analysis, the Department of Legislative Services wrote that although OCME can continue to operate without accreditation, being accredited by NAME improves the public’s trust that the office is performing its work in a proper environment and limits questions about the validity of MEs’ findings at trials.

DLS pointed out that increased ME vacancies and higher caseloads have led to this ratio, and it is likely to have lasting impacts on recruitment and retention efforts.

Abby Isaacs at WMAR first reported this story.

Brian Laundrie, who was found dead last month in a Florida swamp, died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound, officials announced Tuesday.Laundrie had been the subject of a manhunt for more than a month as investigators searched for clues in the slaying of his girlfriend, Gabby Petito, during their cross-country van trip together.The medical examiner in Sarasota County, where Laundrie's body was found, said in a news release that the cause of death was a gunshot wound, and the manner of death was suicide.Attorney Steve Bertolino, who represents Laundrie's parents, said in a statement that the family had been informed about the autopsy results."Chris and Roberta are still mourning the loss of their son and are hopeful that these findings bring closure to both families," Bertolino said.Found in a Florida nature preserve, Laundrie's skeletal remains were positively identified last month using dental records.The discovery of the remains concluded a massive search involving federal, state and local law enforcement that began shortly after Laundrie disappeared Sept. 14, two weeks after the 23-year-old returned alone to his parents' home in North Port, Florida.The investigation into Petito’s slaying, however, has not yet concluded. But only Laundrie was ever identified by law enforcement officials as a person of interest in the case.Petito’s family reported the 22-year-old woman missing Sept. 11, launching a search that garnered worldwide media attention and, in Laundrie’s case, focused largely on the Carlton Reserve wilderness park near the Laundrie home. It is a densely wooded, swampy area that’s home to alligators, coyotes, bobcats, snakes and numerous other creatures.Petito's remains were discovered Sept. 19 on the edge of Grand Teton National Park in Wyoming, one of the places the young couple had visited on the trip they documented through social media videos. Authorities said the body had been there for about a month.An autopsy in Wyoming concluded Petito died by strangulation and that it was a homicide. Laundrie was listed as a "person of interest" in her killing but he was charged only with fraudulent use of a debit card that was not his.Richard Stafford, attorney for Petito’s family, said they would have no immediate comment on Laundrie’s cause of death.

Gabby Petito's disappearance and death have sparked many questions and stoked national attention, and on Tuesday a piece of the mystery could be revealed as authorities are scheduled to provide an update on her final autopsy report.

The Teton County Coroner Dr. Brent Blue will discuss the ruling on 22-year-old Petito's autopsy at 12:30 p.m. local time (2:30 p.m. ET) and will follow up with a brief question-and-answer session, according to a news release from his office.

Blue previously ruled the manner of her death a homicide in his preliminary findings, but the cause of death remained pending further autopsy results, according to the FBI.

Petito had spent the summer traveling the Western U.S. with her fiancé, 23-year-old Brian Laundrie, and documenting their adventures on social media. But when Laundrie returned to the Florida home they shared with his parents in their van, Petito wasn't with him.

She was first reported missing by her parents on Sept. 11, and after an extensive search, her remains were found on Sept. 19 in Wyoming's Bridger-Teton National Forest.

Petito's body was found a five-to-10 minute walk from where her van was last seen in Wyoming, her mother Nichole Schmidt and stepfather Jim Schmidt said in an exclusive interview with Dr. Phil McGraw last week.

Her case has elicited heartbreak, outrage and intrigue in much of the public, but it has also highlighted the tens of thousands of missing persons' stories that do not garner such intense interest. There were nearly 90,000 active missing person cases as of the end of 2020, according to the National Crime Information Center. Few missing person cases are met with as much urgency and national attention as Petito's.

The mystery has deepened given the disappearance of Laundrie, who went for a hike in a local Florida nature reserve shortly after Petito was reported missing, according to his parents.

Laundrie has not been charged in the death of Petito, but he was indicted on charges of using two financial accounts that did not belong to him in the days following her death.

What we know about Petito's final days

From the posts on social media, Petito's final days looked idyllic. But after she was reported missing, accounts surfaced of rising conflict between the couple.

Petito called her mom regularly, and those conversations appeared to reveal there was "more and more tension" in Petito's relationship, according to a police affidavit for a search warrant of an external hard drive found in the couple's van.

On Aug. 27, an "odd text" from Petito worried her mother that something was wrong, according to a search warrant.

"Can you help Stan, I just keep getting his voicemails and missed calls," the message read, according to the affidavit. Stan was a reference to Petito's grandfather, who her mother said Petito never referred to that way, according to the affidavit.

Along their travels, the couple was stopped by police after a 911 caller told dispatchers Aug. 12 he saw a man hitting a woman, according to audio provided by the Grand County Sheriff's Office in Moab, Utah.

"We drove by and the gentleman was slapping the girl," the caller said. "Then we stopped. They ran up and down the sidewalk. He proceeded to hit her, hopped in the car and they drove off."

CNN obtained dispatch audio recordings from the Grand County Sheriff's office last month that shed more light on what Moab police were told about "some sort of altercation."

And on Aug. 27, a witness described a "commotion" as they were leaving the Merry Piglets Tex-Mex restaurant in Jackson, Wyoming.

Petito was in tears and Laundrie was visibly angry, going into and out of the restaurant several times, showing anger toward the staff around the hostess stand, the witness Nina Angelo said. The couple's waitress was also visibly shaken by the incident, said Angelo, who told CNN she did not see any violence or physical altercation between Petito and Laundrie.

A manager at Merry Piglets, who declined to give her name, did see "an incident" at the restaurant and called the FBI, she told CNN. The manager declined to describe what happened and said the restaurant did not have surveillance video of the incident.

The search for Laundrie

Before he disappeared, police in North Port were surveilling Laundrie as best they legally could, a police spokesperson told CNN.

Investigators said Laundrie's parents told them on Sept. 17 that he had left home days earlier and was headed to the nearby Carlton Reserve — sparking a search of the nature reserve's 25,000 acres. Initially, his parents said he left on Sept. 14, but last week, Laundrie family attorney Steven Bertolino said, "We now believe the day Brian left to hike in the preserve was Monday, Sept. 13."

When he left, he didn't take his cell phone and wallet with him, and his parents were concerned he might hurt himself, a source close to Laundrie's family told CNN.

At the time, Laundrie was not wanted in connection with a crime, but North Port Police spokesperson Josh Taylor said Laundrie had an "enormous amount of pressure" on him to provide answers in Petito's disappearance.

The FBI searched the Laundrie home on Sept. 20, removing a number of items and towing away a Ford Mustang convertible.

Attention then turned toward the Carlton nature preserve, where authorities combed through swampland filled with snakes and alligators, utilizing drones, dive teams and bloodhounds.

After more than a week of searching for Laundrie, the FBI went back to his parents, asking for personal items of his to assist with DNA matching. They provided what they could, Bertolino, the Laundries' lawyer, told multiple news outlets.

Laundrie's father has participated in a search of the nature reserve for him, but he has no plans to assist in police searches and the couple will not take a polygraph test, Bertolino said.

Remembering Gabby

The identification of Petito's remains sparked mourning and memorials across the country — for those who knew her as well as those who felt connected to her.

Joseph Petito described his daughter in a eulogy as a "happy girl," who people would gravitate toward. She made others feel welcome, he said, and she loved being outdoors, scuba diving, hiking the Appalachian Trail or snowboarding down sand dunes in Colorado.

"I want you to be inspired by Gabby, that's what we're looking for," Joseph Petito said. "If there's a trip that you guys want to take, take it now. Do it now while you've got the time.

"If there's a relationship that you're in that might not be the best thing for you, leave it now," he said, an apparent reference to his daughter's relationship with Laundrie.

Petito's stepfather, Jim Schmidt, also gave a eulogy, telling those gathered, "Parents aren't supposed to bury their children. That's not how this is supposed to work."

Petito provides "an example for all of us to live by," Schmidt said, "to enjoy every moment in this beautiful world, as she did — to love and give love to all like she did."