A woman who was killed in a murder-suicide was inadvertently cremated before her open-casket funeral, and now her devastated family has filed a lawsuit against the Las Vegas funeral home, calling the apparent blunder a “systematic failure.”
Loren Chavez, 41, was fatally shot on 17 September 2022 and found dead next to her husband Raymundo Chavez, 43, who died by suicide, the Las Vegas Review-Journal reported last year.
Her grieving family had planned to see her one last time with an open-casket funeral at Davis Funeral Home and Memorial Park.
But when they dropped off clothes for Ms Chavez’s body, staff members at the funeral home could not find her in the system, the lawsuit claims. They then discovered she had been cremated by mistake.
Mike Wilfong, the funeral home’s general manager, confirmed to the Las Vegas Review-Journal that an accidental cremation did occur and that the staff members are doing “everything we can” to resolve the issue.
But in the lawsuit, Ms Chavez’s parents said that seeing their daughter one last time and burying her body was very important to them and their religion.
They are suing Davis Funeral Home and Memorial Park, Legacy Funeral Holdings of Nevada LLC. for negligence and seeking $15,000 plus attorney fees.
The family’s lawyer Christian Morris said an accidental cremation should have never happened.
“You have a system of checks and balances in these funeral homes, so this isn’t just like a one-off, it’s a systematic failure,” Morris said.
Ms Chavez was a beloved daughter, sister, and mother, according to her Legacy.com obituary.
