This Friday, an American couple pleaded guilty to mistreatment of corpses, after storing 191 bodies intended for cremation at room temperature. They should spend 20 years in prison.
A story that aroused disgust in the American West. This Friday, November 22, Jon and Carie Hallford, owners of a funeral home near Colorado Spring (United States), pleaded guilty to mistreatment of corpses, after having preserved the remains of 191 people supposed to be cremated.
The bodies were poorly stored, notably in an “out of order” fridge. It was the neighborhood, which a year ago, allowed the discovery of the bodies by complaining of a strong smell of putrefaction. According to AP, the atmosphere was so bitter that the police had to equip themselves to enter the building.
“rats and maggots were eating his face”
“The bodies were lying on the floor, stacked on shelves, abandoned on stretchers, stacked on top of each other or simply stacked in rooms,” said prosecutor Rachael Powell, specifying that the victims’ families declared themselves “deeply and eternally outraged” by the situation.
The American press agency notably relayed the testimony of Crystina Page, whose son, David, died in 2019. His remains were thus in the open air until last year: “He remained lying in the corner of a broken refrigerator, taken out of his body bag, with rats and maggots eating his face. Now, every time I think of my son, I have to think of Jon and Carie, and that will never disappear from my mind.
For years, the Hallfords gave dried concrete instead of the ashes of the deceased to families. Likewise, the couple defrauded nearly $900,000 in state aid during the Covid-19 pandemic, before spending it on trips, luxury cars, stays in Las Vegas and Florida, as well as cryptocurrencies.
This Friday, in court, the two pleaded guilty to negotiate their sentence and avoid a judgment at trial. If the judge accepts the deal, Jon is expected to be sentenced to 20 years in prison, while Carie would receive a sentence ranging from 15 to 20 years in prison. “I knew how bad the situation was going, but I chose to do nothing,” the latter testified before the judge.
This affair led to a reform in Colorado to strengthen controls and conditions for the preservation of remains in the state, which was considered one of the most flexible in the country in this area. In fact, no inspection was previously required, nor even certificates for business managers.
