Coroner staff 'broke rules by copying Jackson death certificate'

Michael Jackson's death certificate was improperly viewed by at least half a dozen employees at the Los Angeles County coroner's office, it emerged today.

In some cases, the staff members, who had no role in investigating the cause of the pop star's death, appeared to have printed copies before the document became a public record, coroner's official Chief Investigator Craig Harvey told the Los Angeles Times.

"There's only one person in the investigation of Mr Jackson who needed to have a copy of the death certificate, and that was the investigator," Mr Harvey said.

Improper views of the certificate, which is stored in a state-supervised computer system, were a breach of internal rules, not any laws, he said.

A coroner's captain issued an email warning to the staff that future abuses of the system could result in disciplinary action.

Mr Harvey also revealed that within two weeks of the entertainer's death on June 25, the certificate had been viewed more than 300 times.

The electronic death registration system can be accessed by anyone with a state-issued password, including employees at coroner's offices, undertakers, hospitals and county and state registrar's offices.