{"data":{"id":"us-ky/krs-397.1005","jurisdiction":"us-ky","citation":"KRS 397.1005","heading":"Evidence of death or status.","body":"In addition to the rules of evidence in courts of general jurisdiction, for the purposes of\nKRS 397.1001 to 397.1007 only, the following rules relating to a determination of death\nand status shall apply:\n(1) Death shall be deemed to occur when  the require ments of KRS 446.400 have been\nmet.\n(2) A certified or authenticated copy of a death certificate purporting to be issued by an\nofficial or agency of the place where the death purportedly occurred shall be prima\nfacie evidence of the fact, place, date, and time of death and the identity of the\ndecedent.\n(3) A certified or authenticated copy of any record or report of a governmental agency,\ndomestic or foreign, that an individual is missing, detained, dead, or alive shall be\nprima facie evidence of the status  and of the dates, circumstances, and places\ndisclosed by the record or report.\n(4) In the absence of prima facie evidence of death under subsection (2) or (3) of this\nsection, the fact of death shall be established by clear and convincing evidence,\nincluding circumstantial evidence.\n(5) An individual whose death is not established under subsection (2), (3), or (4) of this\nsection and who is absent for a continuous period of seven (7) years, during which\nthe individual has not been heard from, and whose abs ence is not satisfactorily\nexplained after diligent search or inquiry, shall be presumed dead. His or her death\nshall be presumed to have occurred at the end of the period unless there is sufficient\nevidence for determining that death occurred earlier.\n(6) In the absence of evidence disputing the time of death stipulated on a document\ndescribed in subsection (2) or (3) of this section, a document described in\nsubsection (2) or (3) of this section that stipulates a time of death one hundred\ntwenty (120) hour s or more after the time of death of another individual, however\nthe time of death of the other individual is determined, establishes by clear and\nconvincing evidence that the individual survived the other individual by one\nhundred twenty (120) hours.","path":["KRS Chapter 397"],"source_url":"https://apps.legislature.ky.gov/law/statutes/statute.aspx?id=36455","current_through":"Includes enactments through the 2026 Regular Session","vintage":"09/05/2026","retrieved_at":"2026-09-05T20:59:28Z","sha256":"77878b555047c59929fc3085062d1e1ff035287076906f5775690a1ec6d3093c","source_id":"us-ky","stale":false,"prev":"us-ky/krs-397.1004","next":"us-ky/krs-397.1006"},"notice":"GroundRules: Original legal text. Not legal advice."}