Brazos County medical examiner's office nearly complete

Before the new Brazos County Medical Examiner's Office opens for business in September, it will serve as the temporary meeting place for commissioners court.

The 22,084-square-foot, $33.8 million facility under construction on 29th Street in Bryan is mostly complete and was shown off to local media Friday morning. County officials noted that commissioners court will be held in the building's conference room in August and September due to renovation taking place at the Brazos County Administration Building.

Dr. Jennifer Dierksen, director of forensic services and future medical examiner for Brazos County, guided media representatives through the facility, including the exam rooms, observation platform, storage rooms and other sections of the building that the general public will not normally have access to.

The public will have an opportunity to tour the facility during an Aug. 19 open house.

The county broke ground on the facility in December 2024. According to project manager Trevor Lansdown, the office will open in September with a monthlong transition to make sure everything is operational. In October, Dierksen will officially become the medical examiner.

"So, it's a transition process," Dierksen said. "In September, we will start taking cases into our office for examinations, but we will be going to the scene and then reporting back to the precinct justices of the peace for authorization to do the postmortem examination. They are very eager to transition, letting me take over the process of death investigations. … Come October, that is the plan now for me to be appointed as medical examiner. At which point, I have jurisdiction over death investigations, without the justices of the peace."

Dierksen said she has just about finished hiring her staff. She is currently interviewing for a forensic technician to assist with autopsies. She has already hired an operations administrator, two investigators and an administrative assistant.

"We're hoping to expand sooner rather than later. We need more investigators," she said.

Lansdown said the facility is substantially complete, with a few punch list items remaining. Furniture, computers and other office supplies will arrive over the next few weeks.

He said the cost of the facility was higher than normal because the 12-acre site was raw land that had to be cleared and utilities brought in. Aside from that, he said the project is coming in under budget.

"I think we'll end up getting somewhere in the tune of half a million [dollars] to $750,000 back that went unspent on the project," he said.

Vaughn Construction is building the facility. Houston-based PGAL was the architect and MWL Labs provided consulting services.

Dierksen said it will be a big benefit to county residents once the office is operational. Currently, the county transports about 150 bodies a year to Travis County to be autopsied.

"I believe the autopsy cost is about $4,600 an autopsy, and it's $1,200 to transport," she said. "When I did back of the napkin math for here, it's going to cost maybe, including all the salaries and things like that, I estimated around $3,500 [per local autopsy]. But they're being done here. They're only transported here. They're not going outside the county. They're closer to their loved ones, so the cost will be better for the county."

She also noted that Brazos County eventually plans to contract for medical examiner servicers with neighboring counties, which would provide a revenue stream. The facility is also built to serve as a teaching facility, and Dierksen is in talks with Texas A&M University and Blinn College about collaborations.

"We've got a great teaching space," she said. "I'm hoping to offer teaching sessions for people who are interested in going into death investigations or different areas of forensic analysis. … We're hoping to fully develop out their forensic investigative sciences degree they have now, add on graduate certificates, maybe even a master's degree or even a Ph.D. in the future, and you know, offering that here at A&M would just be a big boon for the county."

Dierksen, 39, graduated from A&M in 2008 and from the Texas A&M Health Science Center College of Medicine in 2012. She served as a deputy medical examiner in Travis County from 2018 until she was hired here in 2025, and was an associate medical examiner in Jacksonville, Florida, prior to that.

Copyright 2026 Tribune Content Agency. All Rights Reserved.

This story was originally published July 11, 2026 at 9:37 AM.