MEMPHIS, TN (WMC-TV) – A Mid-South funeral home is under fire after a family said it cremated the wrong body and put their loved one in another person’s casket.
When Katherine McClamrock lost her mother, Billie Sue Smith, in June, she trusted High Point Funeral Chapel to honor her mother’s wish to be cremated.
“We had no reason to believe that everything wasn’t fine until we got the call from Nashville,” McClamrock said.
The Tennessee Board of Funeral Directors told McClamrock the ashes she thought belonged to her mother were likely those of a complete stranger.
Former High Point employee Oliver Ewing told the board the funeral home mistakenly cremated a man who was to be buried. Ewing said when he alerted his boss, he was told to “remove Billie Sue Smith’s remains from her body bag and remove any and all identification.”
“His story is that his boss told him don’t tell him anybody,” Attorney Jeff Rosenblum said. “Let’s bury the woman in the man’s grave, let’s give the woman’s family the man’s ashes.”
Rosenblum brought a medical examiner to the grave sight marked John Hughes. But inside the casket were the remains of Billie Sue Smith.
Smith’s loved ones are now grieving all over again.
