Funeral home owners left body to decompose over three years, says indictment

SPARTANBURG Co., S.C. (WSPA) – The owners of a funeral home, where a woman’s body was found almost three years after her remains were supposed to be cremated, have been indicted, according to SC Attorney General Alan Wilson.

Roderick M. Cummings and Lawrence R. Meadows were indicted Friday on Desecration of Human Remains.

The indictment alleges they failed to properly care for a body while operating Family First Funeral Home.

The body was left unattended in a storage room for over three years after her remains were supposed to be cremated, according to the indictment.

The body had decomposed beyond recognition, according to the report.

They face a maximum penalty of 10 years and a fine of $5,000.

The funeral home’s license was suspended earlier this year by the S.C. Department of Labor, Licensing and Regulation.

Authorities have been investigating since Mary Alice Pitts Moore’s body was found in February – almost

The 63-year-old Donalds woman died in March 2015.

The arrest warrants for Cummings and Meadows said they “allowed the human remains to decompose beyond recognition over a period of nearly three years in an unrefrigerated room located at First Family Funeral Home …”

“After Moore’s family failed to pay the funeral costs in full, the defendant failed to properly care for Moore’s remains,” according to the affidavit. “The defendant violated the sanctity of Moore’s remains and failed to treat them with respect and reverence.”

Moore’s family is suing the funeral home, claiming her body was left to rot in a storage room.