Cremains, body found in search related to Colo. probe

Colorado authorities issued an arrest warrant Friday for a former funeral home owner they say kept a deceased woman’s body in a hearse for two years at a home where police also found up to 30 cremated remains.

The grisly discovery occurred Feb. 6 during a courtordered eviction of a Denver house rented by 33-year-old Miles Harford, who owned Apollo Funeral and Cremation Services in the Denver suburb of Littleton, Denver police said. It had been closed since September 2022.

The discovery is the latest in a string of horrific cases in recent years involving mishandled bodies by funeral home operators in Colorado, which has some of the weakest oversight of the funeral industry in the nation. The state has no routine inspections of funeral homes or qualification requirements for operators.

One married couple is awaiting trial in Colorado Springs following their arrest last year for allegedly abandoning almost 200 bodies over several years inside a bug-infested facility and giving fake ashes to family members of the deceased. The operators of another funeral home in the western Colorado city of Montrose received federal prison sentences last year for mail fraud after they were accused of selling body parts and distributing fake ashes.

Mr. Harford, who police said is not on the run and is cooperating, is expected to be charged with abuse of a corpse, forgery of the death certificate and theft of the money paid for the cremation. Other charges are possible as the investigation continues, said Denver District Attorney Beth McCann.