In an unusual and tragic case, Re A (A Child)[2015] EWHC 443 (Fam), brought by an NHS Trust seeking declarations as the fact that a child was brain dead and that the ventilator providing them with life support could be turned off, Hayden J has confirmed what should happen where there is doubt as to whether brain steam death has occurred in a child.  Although a Coroner has concurrent jurisdiction and the High Court has jurisdiction over a body, Hayden J referred with approval to the passage in Jervis on Coroners (13th Edition) at paragraph 5-14, which provides that: "The coroner may also be faced with the difficult task of deciding whether a body in his area is actually dead, for instance when it is connected to a life support machine in an irreversible coma... it appears that once a person has suffered brain stem death which no medical treatment is able to reverse, the person is 'dead' for the purposes of the coroner acquiring jurisdiction even whilst a machine ventilates the body." Hayden J continued: “21. […] That proposition is said to be supported by Mail Newspapers v Express Newspapers [1987] FSR 90; Airedale NHS Trust v Bland [1993] AC 789. The footnote also refers to Thurston's Coronership: 3rd Edition 1985, which sets out the view that I have just recorded but also the opposing one, that while the heart beats and the blood circulates, there is no "dead" body i.e. for the purposes of establishing the Coroner's jurisdiction. I note that the distinguished authors also make the following observation which, in tone, seems to imply that they regard it as self evident: ‘Of course, in practice no Coroner would insist on taking possession of the body were it was still connected to a life support system.’  22.  I associate myself entirely with those observations. I cannot conceive of any circumstances in which the Coroner should seek to intervene, where a body remains ventilated, beyond those circumstances concerning the removal of organs where the family are consenting. Any other approach I regard as likely to generate immense distress and contribute to an atmosphere where sound judgment may be jeopardised.” Exactly the same propositions must hold true in relation to adults and, as with a child, the proper forum for resolution of the questions that follow upon brain death must be the Court (in that case, the Court of Protection). [A version of this note appeared in theMarch 2015 39 Essex Chambers Mental Capacity Law Newsletter]