Mixed-up remains, rotting bodies, fake ashes: How grieving families uncovered these five funeral home horrors

Funeral home horror stories have cropped up across the country in an industry riddled with mishaps. 

For forty years until this May, Colorado's funeral directors did not need licenses to operate, and they faced minimal oversight. A litany of horror stories that emerged from the state were "bound to happen," Bill Booker, owner of Roller Funeral Homes and member of the Arkansas State Board of Embalmers and Funeral Directors told Fox News Digital.

But even in states with tighter regulations, cases of frightful mix-ups and mismanagement crop up, traumatizing already-grieving families and sparking public outrage.

"I would assure the public that plenty of safeguards are in place, and these instances couldn't go on for very long outside the situation that was in Colorado," Booker said. I "I think most funeral professionals consider themselves to have a sacred trust between their clients and themselves and really aspire to be in this profession."

Regardless, when funeral home mismanagement makes the news, those in the profession are shaken. 

"A lot of the work in the funeral profession is done when no one else is present -- no one but the funeral director and the deceased," Booker said. "People need to have the proper education but also the proper heart to serve the public at such a tender time."

1. Hundreds of bodies left to rot by Colorado funeral directors who misused COVID relief funds on vacations, lavish lifestyle

In April, nearly 200 decaying, maggot-infested bodies were found abandoned in a building by Colorado Springs' Back to Nature Funeral Home owners John and Carie Hallford, Fox News Digital previously reported.

The couple were charged with five counts of abuse of a corpse, five counts of theft, four counts of money laundering and over 50 counts of forgery. 

Instead of their deceased relatives' ashes, the Hallfords allegedly presented families with dry concrete and buried the wrong body on two occasions. In total, they collected $130,000 from bereaved families for cremation and burial services that they never followed through with. In court, an FBI agent testified that the money was enough to cover cremation costs for all the abandoned bodies twice over.

The mugshots of Jon Hallford, left, and Carie Hallford, right, the owners of Return to Nature Funeral Home. (Muskogee County Sheriff's Office via AP, File)

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Based on text messages exchanged by the couple, the accumulation of bodies began four years before the grisly discovery. In their messages, the couple had discussed dumping the bodies into a hole, then treating them with lye or setting them on fire.

A later indictment claimed that the Hallfords also used $882,300 in COVID pandemic relief funds to buy cars, dinners, cryptocurrency, their child's tuition and a slew of vacations.

"In Colorado, it was just a matter of time that someone who was not regulated, not licensed, with no governmental oversight, they eventually lose their sense of right and wrong, and the results are just horrifying," Booker told Fox News Digital.

The Hallfords were ordered to pay out more than $1 million to the families of the deceased in August, CNN reported.

2. Former Colorado funeral director arrested for hoarding cremated remains, woman's body in hearse for two years

Two years after his mortuary business closed, a funeral director was found with the cremated remains of up to 30 people in his rented home this February.

Police made the sickening discovery during a court-ordered eviction of 33-year-old Miles Harford from his Denver home on February 6, Fox News Digital previously reported.

Harford also kept the remains of a deceased woman inside a hearse for two years. He acknowledged to police that he owed money to several crematories in the area and that none would cremate the woman’s body, so he decided to store it in the hearse, the Colorado Sun reported.

Seen here is the Return to Nature Funeral Home, in Penrose, Colorado, where stacks of human remains were discovered, and bodily fluid several inches deep covered the floor, an FBI agent testified. (AP Photo/David Zalubowski, File)

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His business, Apollo Funeral and Cremation Services, had been closed since September 2022.

Booker said that "greed" or "the lack of a moral compass" could have motivated Harford. 

"Maybe [he didn't] intend to make a pattern of this. But when you go down that road once, and no one detects it, you can do it again and again," Booker said.

A warrant issued for Harford's arrest at the time listed potential charges of abuse of a corpse, forgery of the death certificate, and theft of the money paid for cremation.

3. Long Island sisters sue funeral home for $60 million after wrong man buried in their father's plot, wearing his favorite t-shirt

Stacy Holzman and Megan Zaner claim that a South Carolina funeral home mistakenly sent the wrong person's remains to New York for burial when their father died out of state, and that New York funeral directors insisted it was the correct body even though the women didn't recognize the man in the casket.

The Long Island sisters sued Fletcher Funeral Home and Cremation Service in Fountain Inn, S.C., and Star of David Memorial Chapels in West Babylon, New York, for $60 million in damages after the interment imbroglio last February.

The women suspected that something was awry when they asked for a final look at their dad. Although the man was wearing his favorite Led Zepplin shirt, his face didn't look quite right.

A photo of an empty morgue at a crematorium. (Fox News )

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"Where is his facial hair?" Stacy Holzman asked the funeral home, according to CBS News. "The funeral director said it's standard practice that we shave everybody."

The man also had an autopsy scar on his forehead, but the women had asked that their father be buried according to Jewish tradition, which does not allow for autopsies. 

"Again, the funeral director is dismissing it, saying, 'Oh, it's standard for if somebody passes in a hospital,' and I'm like, 'No, this isn't right, I don't recognize him,'" Holzman told the outlet.

Weeks later, the South Carolina funeral home confirmed the women's suspicions. In the lawsuit, they claim that his body had been left "abandoned" inside the morgue "without dignity or respect." The bereaved daughters buried their father later without his favorite clothing.

The Star of David said in a statement that the family "confirmed the identification of the deceased at the cemetery" before the burial, Fox News Digital previously reported. Star of David said it "took swift and decisive action to contact the family and offer whatever services needed to lessen their grief" after Fletcher notified them of the mistake.

"We deeply regret any sorrow experienced by the family for the mistake made by the funeral home in South Carolina," the Star of David said, adding that "families are under a great deal of stress when they identify their deceased."

Booker said that he had "never seen" a body mix-up during his 44 years in the funeral profession. 

"I don't know what all the background information is, but I would like to hope that the people who pass away went through an extended illness and maybe don't look like themselves as often," he said. "A mistake could happen in the healthcare setting where the wrong identification is put on the deceased person . . . two people passed away at approximately the same time, there's a missed identification between the deceased, and you have two funeral homes that are impacted by that."

4. New Jersey funeral home nearly buries woman 20 years younger in place of 93-year-old woman

The family of Kyung Ja Kim, who died on November 10, 2021, sought a $50 million settlement from two funeral homes, a funeral director and a mortician after the wrong woman was almost buried in their mother's stead.

Kummi Kim, the woman's daughter, told NorthJersey.com that their family thought that embalming technology had gotten so good that it made their deceased mother look much younger. 

Kyung Ja Kim wore dentures, and the other woman's body had a full set of teeth, the family's attorney told the outlet. The dentures were later found under the casket pillow. 

A person lays a rose on the grave of a soldier at Arlington National Cemetery, United States military cemetery, on Memorial Day, which is held annually to honor those who died while serving in the armed forces in Virginia, United States on May 29, 2023. (Celal Gunes/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images)

Mourning family members, many who had traveled from Korea, began to throw shovelfuls of dirt onto the woman's casket during burial. The family realized that something was amiss when funeral director Haemin Gina Chong tried to hurry mourners away.

Chong allegedly showed Kummi Kim a photo of the 93-year-old, asking whether it was her mother. When Kummi Kim replied in the affirmative, Chong allegedly directed the cemetery to lift the casket out of the grave and bring it back to the funeral home, leaving friends and family flabbergasted. 

5. Texas funeral home sued for allegedly letting body "literally rot" during Winter Storm Uri in 2021

Julietta Guerra sued Integrity Funeral Home in south Houston last February, claiming that her son, Edward Silva, had not been embalmed for four days.

Fox News Digital previously reported that Silva had died unexpectedly on February 9, 2021. According to Guerra's lawsuit, funeral home director Hilda Rojas assured the woman that her son would be embalmed by Feb. 12 and that "they would make him look like he was real."

Guerra was allegedly told that her son's body wasn't ready yet on February 12, then again when she called the next day.

On February 14, Winter Storm Uri hit Houston. Guerra and her husband drove to the funeral home when they were unable to reach them by phone. The door was locked, and the mourning parents noticed that there weren't any generators as they drove around they building.

Guerra arrived at the funeral home on Feb. 22 with a beautician to do Silva's hair and makeup. The lawsuit said he was "severely decomposed" and smelled so strongly that the beautician told Guerra's sister to not let her see her son. The funeral home director allegedly did not say anything to any family member beforehand about the state of the body.

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The funeral suit that the family had brought for Silva also would not fit because of "extreme post-mortem swelling," according to the lawsuit. The clothing ultimately had to be cut open and draped over his body for him to be able to wear it. 

The family was forced to hold a closed-casket funeral, with many of more than 100 mourners "retching" at the smell. 

"No family should have to endure the desecration of their loved one's body like the Guerra family did," family attorney Omar Khawaja said. "We intend to hold Integrity Funeral Home at Forest Lawn Cemetery accountable for their egregious conduct."