The proprietor of a south Georgia funeral residence has been charged with 17 counts of abuse of a lifeless physique after 18 decomposing our bodies, together with these of youngsters, had been present in a cooler on the facility.
Espresso county sheriff’s workplace deputies had been serving an eviction discover on Saturday at Johnson Funeral House when the stays had been found in “numerous levels of decomposition”, investigators mentioned.
The funeral residence’s director, Chris Johnson, 39, was arrested and charged. Johnson had reportedly stopped paying hire on the property, resulting in an eviction discover.
Together with 18 our bodies, together with “a couple of youngster”, a canine and a cat had been additionally saved within the cooler. The Douglas fireplace division hazmat group was known as to the scene.
The warrant for Johnson’s arrest mentioned he had “knowingly and willfully defaced a lifeless physique whereas the physique is ready for burial, displaying, or cremation in a funeral institution”.
It additional said “willful negligence in his duties as a funeral residence director and intentional disregard of correct storage” led to stays being stored for extreme intervals, leading to extreme disfigurement of 17 our bodies. Johnson was denied bail at a listening to.
Earlier this yr, Johnson ran for Espresso county coroner however was defeated by Brandon Musgrove, receiving slightly below 29% of the vote, based on the Atlanta-Journal Structure.
After the election, Johnson introduced plans to run once more in 4 years.
“I’ll use these subsequent 4 years to develop with every one in every of you,” he mentioned.
The invention comes after one other case within the state by which a person, Ray Brent Marsh, pleaded responsible to 787 counts of theft, abuse of a corpse and burial service fraud after the stays of 334 folks had been discovered at his enterprise in 2002. He was sentenced to 12 years in jail.
The house owners of a Colorado funeral residence pleaded responsible to fraud earlier this week after 200 decomposing our bodies had been found at their enterprise, the Return to Nature funeral residence.
In keeping with the US justice division, Jon and Carie Hallford didn’t bury or cremate our bodies entrusted to them and gave relations urns crammed with dry concrete combine as a substitute of ashes. Additionally they used an $800,000 pandemic enterprise mortgage on private purchases, together with holidays, beauty medical procedures and cryptocurrency.
Investigators mentioned that situations contained in the Colorado Springs enterprise had been so disgusting {that a} paramedic investigating the location developed a rash and needed to be medically evaluated.
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