Authorities find more bodies after initial report of 115 two weeks ago, when owners were evicted and police investigated foul odor

The remains of at least 189 decaying bodies were found and removed from a Colorado funeral home, up from about 115 reported when the bodies were discovered two weeks ago, officials said Tuesday.

The remains were found by authorities responding to a report of a foul odor at the Return to Nature funeral home inside a decrepit building in the small town of Penrose, Colorado.

Efforts to identify the remains began last week with help from an FBI team that gets deployed to mass casualty events like airline crashes. Fremont sheriff Allen Cooper described the scene as “horrific”.

  • Chickenstalker@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    Funeral homes are parasites. Families should prepare and bury their own, unembalmed with no casket. A dead body is the most biodegradable matter in nature. Why pump it full of formalin and doll it up like a tart? Mourn the life of the dead, not their physical body.

      • Dkarma@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        This is the answer. It’s a pollution issue as much as a mortician issue.

      • afraid_of_zombies@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        There is this clothing donation dumpster thing by my work that has a couch infront of it. It’s pretty clear to me what happened. Someone brought it, noticed the sign that says no furniture donations, and decided that it wasn’t his problem.

        It would be pretty much like that. Find random bodies everywhere.

      • Mirshe@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        Or just plain old burying a person too shallow. Not a huge problem now, but it’ll be a problem when coyotes and vultures and other scavengers dig the corpse up.

        • CascadianGiraffe@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          FR tho

          It’s somehow three times the work to bury them a second time. Plus you always get stuck fixing during the day.

          Remember kids, if you think you dug the hole deep enough, you didn’t.

    • FraidyBear@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      It’s illegal almost everywhere in the US to have a “natural” burial. There are laws on containers, treatment, and where the deceased can be buried. Dead bodies, while very biodegradable are also toxic and tend to get dug up and parts drug around by animals, up rooted by trees, or dug up during construction after the property is bought out. I do agree that funeral homes are soulless vultures who fleece people in mourning though, the last “fuck you” from capitalism.

        • FraidyBear@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          Yes and no, it’s not a black and white issue. I didn’t really want to go all in on the topic because it’s Googleable. My grandpa recently passed and it’s very expensive, we were looking for alternatives. On a federal level natural burial is allowed. The states take matters into their own hands. Some require burial vaults, some require embalming, some require that natural burials only happen in very specific places, and some require a mix of those things. It’s doable but if they can squeeze money out of you through laws or extreme inconvenience, they will. It’s not as easy and just picking a spot and burying a loved one, in a lot of cases.

          • Mobiuthuselah@lemm.ee
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            1 year ago

            First of all, sorry to hear what you’re going through.

            In regards to natural burial, my understanding is that it’s more legal than not, just that there’s regulations depending on where you live. It’s very rare that embalming is required by law. Burial vaults are typically required when embalming fluids are used to slow the spread of the fluids to waterways. Neither of these are considered part of a natural burial.

            There’s a lot smoke and mirrors in the funeral industry that has led to wide misconceptions and outright misinformation. I asked if you were sure because the points you made are generally what a traditional burial funeral home would tell a client to steer them more towards their products. It’s awful that it’s become common for funeral homes to prey on those that are grieving. Absolutely despicable.

            I hope y’all find a way that honors your grandpa without causing additional stress.

        • JJROKCZ@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          I’m not the guy that you’re responding too but I’ll add my anecdote.

          There was a somewhat off his rocker dude in my hometown that lived with his mom, she died, he didn’t notify anyone, buried her on his land (owned 15-20 acres or so, nothing large) and didn’t tell anyone. A few months go by and she obviously misses doctor appointments, church, etc so police check in. Then the guy says “oh yeah she died, I buried her, no biggie”. Turns out he violated a few laws doing this so he got some light jail time, she got exhumed, investigated to make sure she wasn’t murdered, then buried in a graveyard.

          I lived fairly close to all this being in the same county and learned that in Illinois at least, you can’t just bury your dead, you have to go through some processes.

          • Mobiuthuselah@lemm.ee
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            1 year ago

            That’s right, there’s is a process. You can’t just bury people without reporting the death and going through some sort of process. That’s a good bit different from an actual natural burial even if at face value he did bury her naturally lol. That’s wild. I’ve heard of that happening in my region in the southern Appalachians too.

      • afraid_of_zombies@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        Little of this is true. You can buy a wood casket, embalming is optional. Where you bury yes is regulated but maybe the rest of us don’t want to drink corpse water.

    • stolid_agnostic@lemmy.ml
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      1 year ago

      It turns out that humans and their pets are horrible for the environment because we’re just filled with chemicals from medication, cosmetics, and food. We’re not living our natural best anymore.

    • afraid_of_zombies@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      Embalming is optional and always has been. You can purchase biodegradable caskets and again that was always been an option. Open caskets are by family request and often aren’t even an option.

      I also saw Adam Ruins everything.