A judgment that could exceed $1 billion has been ordered to be paid by the proprietors of a funeral company who are alleged to have neglected to cremate or bury human remains even though they were paid to do so.
According to court records, Carie and Jon Hallford, the proprietors of the Return to Nature Funeral Home in Penrose, Colorado, are accused of mishandling 190 sets of human remains. Judge Lynette Wenner of the Fremont County District Court rendered a judgment against them totaling more than $956 million.
According to court records, a default judgment was entered because the defendants failed to reply to the action.
Attorney Andrew Swan, who represented the class, stated in a letter to the victims’ families that the judgment for the relatives of the deceased might be in excess of $1 billion with interest.
Over $7 million was granted to each family member involved in the class action. Swan told CNN that he thought the sum was the biggest judgment in Colorado history in terms of money.
However, the lawyer stated that it is unlikely that they will get that money from the Hallfords. Apart from the class action suit, the Hallfords are being prosecuted on both federal and state levels.
In 2023, a governmental probe against the company was launched following complaints of an unpleasant smell emanating from the “green burial” funeral home, where human remains were discovered to be mishandled in storage.
According to state charging documents, the Hallfords were taken into custody by the Colorado Bureau of Investigations last year on 190 counts of abuse of a body as well as charges related to theft, money laundering, and forgery.
The United States Attorney’s Office for the District of Colorado reports that the two were indicted earlier this year by a federal grand jury on accusations that included two counts of conspiracy to commit wire fraud and thirteen counts of wire fraud.
According to the federal indictment, the two misled their funeral home clients by failing to give the deceased the cremation or burial that was agreed upon. They are also charged with embezzlement of $882,300 in loans for pandemic assistance. They entered a not guilty plea.
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The Hallfords “hide the gruesome collection of bodies,” according to the prosecution, “by preventing outsiders from entering their building, covering the building’s windows and doors to limit others from viewing inside, and providing false statements to others regarding the foul odor emanating from the building and the true nature of the activity occurring inside.”
Judge Wenner declared in the class action case that the funeral home owners’ families were entitled to “exemplary damages to the statutory cap” because “the Court specifically finds that Defendants acted in a willful and wanton manner.”
