You just can't make this stuff up.
When Lawrence and Abbey Butler's 56-year-old son, Timothy Garlington, passed away in Georgia, they had his remains returned to Pennsylvania for burial. The shipping funeral home was Southern Cremations & Funerals at Cheatham Hill, and the receiving funeral home was Nix and Nix.
It's probably a standard procedure for folks who die away from home.
[Fair Warning: from this point forward, this story has a gross factor of 10/10.]
What's not so standard is that at some point in the process, someone removed Garlington's brain from his body and put it in an unmarked cardboard box among his personal items, which were then handed over to the family.
The family is suing both funeral homes for the emotional trauma this action caused.
Usually, I would say that, while things that cause emotional trauma are terrible mistakes, we're too lawsuit happy in this country, and emotional trauma isn't something that should be awarded financially.
But in this case, well, let's just say I'm feeling a little differently.
The Butlers' attorney, L. Chris Stewart, said at a news conference,
‘Several days later, the red box, which was in the Butlers' car, began to smell and leak fluid, Stewart said. When Lawrence Butler picked it up, the fluid covered his hands, which was brain matter. It's insane.'
Lawrence Butler said that they had to get rid of their car because of the smell, and that now, their final memories of their son are of that awful red box.
Stewart said he had consulted other funeral homes, and that at no point in the process is the brain ‘separated from the body in that fashion and shipped in that fashion'. If it ever is, he said, then it is in a sealed bag and labeled as a biohazard.
According to NBC Philadelphia, the Pennsylvania funeral home insists they did nothing wrong. They back up the lawyer's comments that when a body is shipped to them, it's usually intact, and personal effects usually do not contain body parts.
They also said state inspectors have cleared them of any wrongdoing.
The Georgia funeral home has so far stayed mum on the subject.
But the Butlers' lawyer maintains both funeral homes are at fault:
There's no excuse, there is zero excuse for this type of error to happen. For the Georgia funeral home, Southern Cremations, to ship unmarked, bio-hazardous material. For the funeral home here in Philadelphia to hand the parents an unmarked box, not examined, not listed as part of the inventory that was the personal items, and to not check it. They have not received a single apology to this day from any funeral home.
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