PITTSBURGH — A deputy coroner on her way to a public suicide said she had to first make three personal deliveries for celebrity pathologist Cyril Wecht, who is on trial for allegedly using his county coroner's staff to benefit his lucrative private practice.

Darlene Craig, testifying in the third day of the former Allegheny County coroner's fraud trial, said a supervisor told her to deliver documents or other items as she left for the suicide call, which was a half-hour drive from the coroner's downtown office.

"So I made those three deliveries before I actually went to the hanging," Craig testified. "And the body was hanging outside."

"Literally hanging?" Assistant U.S. Attorney Stephen Stallings asked.

"Yes," Craig said.

Wecht, 76, built a multimillion-dollar practice that has spawned numerous books and television appearances by inquiring into the deaths of Elvis Presley, JonBenet Ramsey and Vincent Foster among others.

He is charged in a 41-count indictment with using his government staff as bookkeepers, secretaries, couriers and gofers for his multimillion-dollar private practice and his family. Wecht, who earned no more than $64,000 a year as county coroner, resigned when he was indicted.

Another deputy, Richard Lorah, said Wecht intervened when a supervisor was debating whether to send Lorah on a Wecht errand or to the scene of a woman killed when her car was driven off a parking garage.

"They're not going anywhere, just let them lay there," Wecht said of the victim, according to Lorah.

Two other deputy coroners testified Wednesday, and all four described so-called "Wecht details" — errands they were assigned several times daily by Wecht himself or, more frequently, his top two deputies and his secretary.

The errands were all done on county time and included taking Wecht or his family to and from the airport or delivering documents to his private offices.

Defense attorneys sought to distance Wecht from the allegations by suggesting that "Wecht details" became routine only after Joe Dominick became chief deputy in the late 1990s.

Deputy Curtis Williams, the dog walker, criticized Dominick's harsh management style. Williams said he didn't mind the errands and was proud to work for Wecht, whom he called a "great doctor."