AIKEN, S.C. (WRDW/WAGT) - A widow is suing after her late husband's body was misidentified and cremated when it wasn't supposed to be.
She claims it shouldn't have taken a lot of effort to know something was amiss, since his gender and race were different from the body that was supposed to be cremated.
Colleen McGlen filed a legal complaint against the Aiken County Coroner's Office, Coroner Darryl Ables, Folk Funeral Home, George Funeral Home & Cremation Center, Scott Ayers and Chris Masters.
Ables previously admitted that a body was misidentified by a member of his staff and wrongly released to a funeral home for cremation.
Soon after the incident in June, Ables said: "This incident is very unfortunate, and we are deeply remorseful to the family of the decedent."
The lawsuit outlines who that decedent was.
Filed Tuesday, it states that on or about June 22, Charles Taylor passed away, and his widow, McGlen, was devastated.
Ables' office took possession of Taylor's body, and McGlen knew she wanted to have an autopsy because of the unexpected nature of his passing.
She intended to hire a private medical examiner if Ables' office elected not to have an autopsy performed.
But a member of the coroner's staff misidentified the body and released it to Ayers and Masters, were were acting on behalf of George Funeral Home, the lawsuit alleges.
They were supposed to pick up a woman's remains, but instead they took Taylor's body to Folk Funeral Home, where it was cremated.
"Multiple systemic failures resulted in the unlawful cremation of Plaintiff's husband," the complaint alleges.
For example, the complaint alleges:
The complaint alleges the ashes McGlen eventually received didn't contain any tag identifying the remains, so she "remains fearful that the ashes that are presently in her possession do not belong to her husband."
Because of the series of errors, the complaint alleges the widow suffered "injury by virtue of the mutilation of the remains of her husband, including pain, suffering, mental anguish, emotional distress as a result of the Defendants' negligence, reckless, willful, and wanton conduct."
The complaint filed in Aiken County states that she wants a jury trial, actual damages, punitive damages, treble damages and attorneys' fees.