After living with the same woman for 51 years, Evan Davidson probably can recognize his own wife. However, when the management of Simpson Family Mortuary of Inglewood showed him Darlene Davidson, 82, in her casket, Evan Davidson promptly said that is not my wife. However, the mortuary insisted that he was wrong and she simply looked different due to embalming. They insisted on burying her and later learned that in fact it was a different woman.
Three days after the burial, another family objected that the body in their casket was not their loved one. Davidson was asked to come to the funeral home and he identified his wife.
The mortuary has offered to exhume the body and pay the costs of burying both women. It will be fortunate if that is the full costs of this negligence. There are extremely strong claims of negligent infliction of emotional distress and negligence (as well as mishandling of a corpse). The lack of basic precautions to avoid such mistakes is breathtaking. This would seem one of the most basic obligations of a funeral home in controlling the handling of bodies.
Mortuary spokesman Reginald Black insisted that “Our main concern is for these people to receive the dignity and respect they deserve, and put the individual to rest. We are not sweeping it under the rug.” True, though you did not sweep it under the rug originally, you buried it under six feet of dirt.
Source: LA Times
Sometimes negligence is just so staggering, all you can say is “wow”.
Wow.
Plagiarism much? http://jezebel.com/5990211/funeral-home-buries-wrong-woman-despite-husbands-insistence-that-she-was-not-his-wife
Wow…. You got tat right gene…..
I recall a few years ago a Hersch was repossessed…. In it they found three bodies…..
two bad joke – apologies in advance
They all look alike to me (dead people! What did you think I meant?)
long joke – so just the setup line & punch line:
How did you change suits so quickly?
I didn’t, I just swapped heads with that body!
I am with you Gene. This is an amazing case of negligence.
Watch the Hearse chasers go after the mortuary. This was just a simple mistake with no lasting damages, maybe even something to smile about in years to come.
Bruce, What about the two weeks of anguish for the 80-something man who wouldn’t be heard? How does he even begin to mourn when he doesn’t know what happened to his wife and the mortuary won’t listen?
There are many local stories of this genre. Some reporter needs to do a nationwide expose of these horrible practices. Of the stories I’ve read and seen, most victims are black as are the perpetrators. We humans often prey on our own. Just ask Bernie Madoff’s clients.
I wonder if this was a case of hubris. “I’m the funeral director, and I cannot possibly be wrong.” then holding evermore strongly to their mistake as the widower continues to prove him wrong.
Given the quality control in this operation, can we even be confident that prior to the embalming process the dearly departed had actually departed?
Mike Appleton, You’re saying he buried the nearly departed also? That would make for a great horror film.
“Parts are parts” should be the motto of that dorkuary.