A national justice volition condemnation a Colorado ceremonial location proprietor for cheating customers and fraud aft helium stashed astir 190 dormant bodies successful a country somesthesia building
ByJESSE BEDAYN Associated Press
DENVER -- A Colorado ceremonial location proprietor accused of stashing astir 190 dormant bodies successful a decrepit gathering and sending grieving families fake ashes is acceptable to beryllium sentenced Friday successful national tribunal for cheating customers and defrauding the authorities retired of astir $900,000 successful COVID-19 aid.
Jon Hallford, proprietor of Return to Nature Funeral Home, pleaded blameworthy to conspiracy to perpetrate ligament fraud past twelvemonth and faces a maximum of 20 years successful prison. Federal prosecutors are seeking a 15-year sentence.
He's pleaded guilty successful a abstracted authorities lawsuit to 191 counts of corpse abuse.
Hallford and co-owner Carie Hallford were accused of storing the bodies betwixt 2019 and 2023 and sending families fake ashes. Investigators described uncovering the bodies successful 2023 stacked atop each different passim a squat, bug-infested gathering successful Penrose, a tiny municipality astir a two-hour thrust southbound of Denver.
The morbid find revealed to galore families that their loved ones weren't cremated and that the ashes they had dispersed oregon cherished were fake. In 2 cases, the incorrect assemblage was buried, according to tribunal documents. Many families said it undid their grieving processes. Some relatives had nightmares, others person struggled with guilt, and astatine slightest 1 wondered astir their loved one's soul.
Federal prosecutors accused some Hallfords of pandemic assistance fraud, siphoning the assistance and spending it and customer's payments connected a GMC Yukon and Infiniti worthy implicit $120,000 combined, on with $31,000 successful cryptocurrency, luxury items from stores similar Gucci and Tiffany & Co., and adjacent laser assemblage sculpting.
Carie Hallford is scheduled to spell to proceedings successful the national lawsuit successful September, the aforesaid period arsenic her adjacent proceeding successful the authorities lawsuit successful which she's besides charged with 191 counts of corpse abuse.
In a tribunal filing requesting a 10-year sentence, Jon Hallford's attorneys said that “Mr. Hallford does not disagree that his behaviour was abhorrent, indecent, and caused sedate harm to many.”
His sentencing successful the authorities lawsuit is scheduled successful August.
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