Marion County has elected a new coroner. Republican Claude Howell, Jr. beat Democrat Anton Dubrick with 74 percent of the vote. The unofficial vote tally pending any late arriving vote by mail ballots was 12,491 for Howell and 3,827 for Dubrick. Howell had earlier defeated incumbent Republican Coroner Troy Cannon in the primary election.
Howell says he’s glad the long race is finally over and he thanks God he won a race he could be proud of. He’s already been working on plans for the office. Howell wants to bring autopsies back to Marion County and will be looking at staffing.
“We will look at how many deputies we have and how many we really need or don’t need. I’ll be very active in the majority of the calls. With that being said, we will probably need a couple of deputies just to have them. We’re going to work really hard on the budget to get things worked out.”
Howell expects the part-time secretary in the office to stay on along with Deputy Coroner Feron Ice. Howell understands Deputy Coroner Doug Krutsinger wants to retire and he will likely be replaced.
Howell’s victory came on both his birthday and his son Brandon’s birthday. He’s thanking his wife, children, and so many people for helping and supporting his campaign.
