By: Jesse Bedayn ……..
CAÑON CITY, Colo. (AP) — At least 115 decaying bodies were found at a storage facility for a “green” funeral operator, after neighbors reported abhorrent smells emanating from the location in rural southern Colorado, police said Friday, calling it a “disturbing discovery.”
The owner tried to conceal the improper storage of corpses and claimed he was doing taxidermy at the facility, according to a suspension letter sent to him by state regulators that was made public Friday. No one has been arrested or charged yet.
The Return to Nature Funeral Home facility in the small town of Penrose had been unregistered with the state for 10 months on Wednesday when owner Jon Hallford spoke by phone with a state regulator the day after the smells were reported and police launched an investigation
Hallford acknowledged that he had a “problem” at the property, though the Colorado Office of Funeral Home and Crematory Registration document obtained by The Associated Press didn’t explain what Hallford meant with his taxidermy claim or how he tried to conceal improper storage of human remains.
Text messages and phone calls were not answered at the funeral home, which had no working voice mail.
Officials declined to describe the scene inside the Return to Nature Funeral Home facility. A multi-agency effort recover and identify the remains was underway in Penrose, a town of about 3,000 people in the mountains west of Colorado Springs.
On Friday, a sour, rotten stench came from the back of the building, where windows were broken. Coroner’s officials from Fremont County and nearby El Paso County parked their trucks outside and discussed among themselves as they walked around the building.
The funeral home performed “green” burials without embalming chemicals or metal caskets. Local residents said they smelled foul odors around the building for months but thought little of it, assuming a dead animal or septic system was to blame.
Funeral home officials were cooperating as investigators sought to determine any criminal wrongdoing, Fremont County Sheriff Allen Cooper said at a news conference.
“Without providing too much detail to avoid further victimizing these families there, the funeral home where the bodies were improperly stored was horrific,” Cooper said.
Some identifications would require taking fingerprints, finding medical or dental records and DNA, Fremont County Coroner Randy Keller said.
“This could take several months. As we identify each decedent, families will be notified as soon as absolutely possible,” Keller said.
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