DENVER — A funeral home owner in Colorado accused of storing nearly 190 decomposing bodies in a room-temperature building and defrauding the federal government out of nearly $900,000 is expected to plead guilty in federal court, according to court documents filed Tuesday.
Carie Hallford, who ran Return to Nature Funeral Home with her husband Jon Hallford, allegedly duped the Small Business Administration out of almost $900,000 in pandemic-era relief aid and cheated customers who had paid for cremations the Hallfords never performed.
Instead, the Hallfords are accused of spending the aid and customers’ payments on lavish goods – luxury cars, cryptocurrency and items from stores like Gucci – all while stashing the bodies and sending fake ashes to the families.
The Hallfords were charged with 15 fraud counts last year in federal court, where Jon Hallford already pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit wire fraud and was sentenced to 20