OVERCOMING DEATH CORONER'S OFFICE JOB TAUGHT CARRIER TO GRAB ONTO HIS LIFE WITH ENTHUSIASM.

Byline: Holly Edwards Staff Writer

When Scott Carrier began his career as an investigator at the Los Angeles County Coroner's Office in 1969, the city was reeling from the grisly Tate-LaBianca murders committed by the Charles Manson cult.

Over the next 33 years, Carrier has been involved in many high-profile murder cases and mysterious deaths: the death of actor William Holden, the Hillside Strangler and Night Stalker murders, and the slashing deaths of O.J. Simpson's ex-wife Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend Ron Goldman.

Now, as he prepares to retire Friday as the coroner's office spokesman, Carrier says the most important lesson he has learned from death is how to live life.

``Death is inevitable. It's part of the cycle of life, and we're all just waiting to die,'' said Carrier, 60. ``But what this teaches you is to live life and enjoy it.''

Carrier conceded it has been difficult to witness the worst of human nature and maintain a sense of balance.

When the Hillside Strangler raped, tortured and strangled 10 young women and dumped their bodies in the hillsides surrounding Hollywood and Glendale in the late 1970s, Carrier was called to five of the crime scenes. His job was to help determine how the victims died in an effort to lead detectives to the killers.

Eventually, two men - Kenneth Bianchi and Angelo Buono - were linked to the murders through hairs and carpet fibers collected at the crime scenes. Both are serving life sentences in prison.

Carrier's boss said his strength as an investigator has been his ability to see similarities among cases. The Coroner's Office works with 50 law enforcement agencies in the county and often establishes links between crimes that occur many miles apart.

``Scott always interacted closely with the detectives and there were certain cases where we made the case,'' said Dr. Lakshmanan Sathyavagiswaran, the county's chief medical examiner.

In the mid-1980s, Carrier was part of the team that investigated the 13 brutal murders linked to a serial killer dubbed the ``Night Stalker.'' Some of the victims were stabbed and mutilated, others were shot, tortured or bludgeoned to death.

Based on reports from witnesses who survived the Night Stalker's attacks, police circulated a sketch of the killer. Richard Ramirez was captured in 1985 by a group of residents who recognized him from news reports. He was convicted of the murders and is awaiting execution at San Quentin.

Carrier also investigated the 1981 death of actor William Holden, who died at age 63 after falling down and hitting his head in his Santa Monica apartment while under the influence of alcohol.

He was also assigned to several disaster investigations, including the 1994 Northridge Earthquake that killed 57 people, the 1992 riots that resulted in 54 deaths, and the midair collision over Cerritos that killed 82 people in 1982.

While Carrier has made a career of poring over grisly crime and accident scenes, he said the most upsetting deaths are those involving children.

``The thing that bothers me the most is when someone takes a small child and mistreats them,'' he said. ``That is very evil and very disturbing.''

Sometimes, while investigating a child's death, Carrier would call his wife at their Long Beach home to make sure their two young children were safe, said his wife, Nancy Jo.

``One time when our kids were small and he was investigating a child who had been hit by a car, he called and told me to go get our children from the playground and bring them home,'' she recalled. ``He just needed to know for the rest of the day that they were safe.''

Carrier said he developed an interest in the human body when he was in high school and spent his evenings at a Montebello hospital where his mother worked as a nurse. His father died in a car crash when Carrier was just 13.

One evening, am ambulance attendant didn't show up and Carrier was called upon to accompany the driver to a fatal traffic crash. After that, Carrier's fascination was sealed.

He landed a job at a local mortuary after school, moving into an apartment upstairs.

``I'd run the vacuum, dust the pews and caskets, wipe down the ambulances,'' Carrier recalled. ``This curtailed my social life, but I became fascinated by the whole process of embalming.''

After graduating from high school, Carrier obtained an embalming license and worked for five years in the mortuary business before getting a job as an embalmer at the Coroner's Office. Six months later, he was promoted to investigator.

He remained an investigator until 1991, when he became the Coroner's Office spokesman, responsible for providing information about the roughly 18,000 deaths the office handles each year.

Just as importantly, Carrier's job has been to withhold information during a criminal investigation or trial.

After the Simpson-Goldman murders, for example, Carrier said he was bombarded by reporters who wanted to know every detail.

``It was horrendous,'' he said. ``There was a lot of information we had to keep sealed because only the suspect would know it.''

As Carrier prepares to retire, he said he is looking forward to golfing and traveling the country with his wife in their new recreational vehicle.

Nancy Jo Carrier said she and her husband have both lost loved ones and have now decided to ``live and love life as we go.''

``The dark side of life is a reality, but we can't do anything about that,'' she said. ``Now we just want to create a lot of good memories because that's all we have in the end.''

CAPTION(S):

2 photos

Photo:

(1 -- color) Scott Carrier, an upbeat fellow at the worst of times, is happy he's retiring from the Coroner's Office after years as an investigator.

Michael Owen Baker/Staff Photographer

(2) What would retirement be without a memento or two? Scott Carrier has some unique ones.

Jeff Gritchen/Staff Photographer