Former and current Franklin County medical officers are facing a lawsuit filed by parents of a North Carolina man mistakenly declared dead. Larry Green was hit by a car on January 2005, his body was placed inside a bag and sent to the morgue, until he was found to be alive, over two hours later.

Green's parents accused the medical officers of not properly checking his vital signs, which led to Green sustaining injuries that might be beyond recovery.

He was hospitalized for two months, suffering from a severe head injury and a broken leg among other wounds. Green started to speak only five months after the accident. He is still in a nursing home.

The emergency crew said they did not detect a breath or pulse on the young man hit by a vehicle while he was walking across a highway. But they admitted they did not use an electrocardiogram monitor or a stethoscope to double check if Green was dead.

Named defendants in the lawsuit were Dr. J.B. Perdue, Franklin County's medical examiner, and the emergency crew that handled Green. Dr. Perdue said it was not his job to determine if a victim is still alive or not.

"The medical examiner is called after death... Someone else pronounced his death, and the medical examiner is called to investigate the cause and manner of that death," Dr. Perdue told U.S.A. Today.