A Colorado funeral home where 190 decaying bodies were found has been ordered to pay US$950 million (C$1.3 billion) to the families of its victims, although the grieving relatives are unlikely to see a payout any time soon, if ever.
The owners of Return to Nature home, in the town of Penrose, Colo., were indicted on federal charges earlier this year, accused of spending nearly US$900,000 in pandemic relief funds on vacations, cosmetic surgery, jewelry and other personal expenses, according to court documents.
Prosecutors also alleged that Jon and Carie Hallford gave families dry concrete instead of cremated ashes, provided false cremation records and buried the wrong body on two occasions.
On Monday it was announced that the Hallfords, who face hundreds of other criminal charges in separate state and federal cases, including the abuse of a corpse, were ordered to pay the families in the civil case.
However, the couple are in serious financial trouble and the class-action suit’s lawyer, Andrew Swan, said it was understood from the outset that the families were unlikely to receive any financial compensation.
“I’m never going to get a dime from them, so, I don’t know, it’s a little frustrating,” Crystina Page, who had hired the funeral home to cremate her son’s remains in 2019, told The Associated Press.
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“If nothing else,” Page said, this judgment “will bring more understanding to the case.”
“I’m hoping it’ll make people go, ‘Oh, wow, this isn’t just about ashes,”‘ she told the outlet.
In October of last year, investigators discovered nearly 200 bodies in the funeral home. The Hallfords allegedly fled Colorado to avoid prosecution and were arrested in Oklahoma in November.
In total, they were charged with 190 counts of abuse of a corpse, four counts of money laundering, five counts of theft and more than 50 counts of forgery.
Swan told The Associated Press that the Hallfords did not acknowledge or attend hearings for the civil case – a disappointment to both his legal team and the suffering families.
“I would have preferred that they participate, if only because I wanted to put them on the witness stand, have them put under oath and ask them how they came to do this, not once, not twice, but hundreds of times,” Swan said.
Jon Hallford is currently in custody, while his wife is out on bail.
The civil lawsuit lists more than 100 family members but has been left open in case other victims come forward since 190 total bodies were discovered in the funeral home’s facility in Penrose, southwest of the company’s office in Colorado Springs.
According to CBS News, the funeral home specialized in “green burials,” where no chemicals, including embalming fluid, were used and the deceased were buried in a biodegradable casket.
The facility came under investigation last year after reports of a foul odour coming from the property. It was determined that some of the remains had languished since 2019.
As far back as 2020, there were concerns raised about the business’s improper storage of bodies. But there was no followup by regulators, letting the collection of bodies grow to nearly 200 over the following three years.
The case has helped push through tougher regulations for funeral homes in Colorado, which has had some of the laxest in the country – historically, Colorado funeral home operators were not required to be licensed, have a degree in mortuary science or even hold a high school degree.
The new legislation will not come into effect until 2026.
— with files from The Associated Press
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