Funeral Home Owners Expected to Plead Guilty in Case of 190 Bodies

The owners of a funeral home in Colorado are expected to plead guilty this week in a case involving 190 decomposing bodies.
The two owners, husband and wife Jon and Carie Hallford, are accused of storing 190 dead bodies in an unrefrigerated facility while providing families with fake ashes. The couple, who face hundreds of charges for alleged corpse abuse, were said to have operated the facility without proper care for the deceased.
They were set to enter guilty pleas on Friday.
The grim discovery of how bodies were being processed at the funeral home last year upended grieving families’ attempts to find closure. Relatives of the deceased described how emotional moments including scattering ashes in a final tribute, feeling comfort in honoring their loved ones’ wishes, or simply holding an urn while reflecting on memories—were now tainted, leaving them with a sense of betrayal instead of peace.
Jon and Carie Hallford, the owners of Return to Nature Funeral Home in Colorado Springs, allegedly started storing bodies in a rundown facility outside the city as early as 2019, court records show. Instead of providing genuine remains, prosecutors say the Hallfords deceived grieving families by handing over containers filled with dry concrete.
Prosecutors allege that while sinking into debt, Jon and Carie Hallford used customers’ payments and nearly $900,000 in COVID-19 pandemic relief funds meant to support their business to instead finance a lavish lifestyle. Court records show the couple spent money on luxury cars, laser body sculpting, trips to Las Vegas and Florida, $31,000 in cryptocurrency, and other high-end purchases.
Last month, the couple admitted to federal fraud charges, agreeing to a plea deal in which they acknowledged defrauding both customers and the government. On Friday, the couple was set to appear in state court, where they are expected to plead guilty to more than 200 counts, including charges of corpse abuse, theft, forgery, and money laundering.
Jon Hallford is being represented by the public defender’s office, which has not provided any statement on the case. Carie Hallford’s attorney, Michael Stuzynski, also declined to comment after The Associated Press reached out.
For four years, clients of the Return to Nature Funeral Home, then run by the accused, believed they were receiving their loved ones’ ashes. Some traveled to scatter the remains in cherished locations, even flying miles to do so. Others took the urns on cross-country journeys or kept them close at home, finding comfort in what they thought were their loved ones’ final remains.
The funeral home offered a service called “green” burials, where they boasted about not using any sort of embalming chemicals, prompting some customers to be lured to the services.
The disturbing discovery that bodies were not being treated properly came last year after residents in the small town of Penrose, southwest of Colorado Springs, alerted authorities to a foul odor coming from a building owned by Return to Nature. Inside, investigators found bodies, some stacked on top of each other and infested with insects. Several were so decomposed that visual identification was impossible.
The conditions inside were so hazardous that responders had to don specialized hazmat suits to enter, limiting their time in the building to short intervals before exiting for extensive decontamination procedures.
The incident at the Return to Nature funeral home prompted lawmakers in Colorado to tighten regulations at funeral homes, as the state previously didn’t have a law requiring routine inspections of these businesses.
This article includes reporting from The Associated Press