Cemetery Mixed Ashes, State Says

The state attorney general’s office has filed charges against Pomona Valley Memorial Park alleging that the cemetery illegally mixed ashes from different cremated bodies and dumped them in a nearby field.

The charges, filed Aug. 15, came after a two-month investigation by the state Cemetery Board in response to allegations by three former employees who lost their jobs at the cemetery earlier this year.

John Gill, executive officer of the board, declined to elaborate on the investigation’s findings, but said his agency is continuing to collect information on activities at the park. Although the maximum penalty for such violations of state health codes is revocation of the cemetery’s license, Gill said he did not think that will happen. “It would harm the families involved,” he said.

In July, a class-action lawsuit against the park was filed on behalf of relatives of people cremated there, alleging the ashes were commingled in a trash can. The suit also alleges that workers mutilated corpses to extract gold dental work before cremation. The attorney filing the suit charged that the park improperly handled ashes of as many as 20,000 corpses dating back to 1961.

But John Lemons, general manager of the Pomona Cemetery Assn., dismissed the charges as “complaints made by former disgruntled employees. To my knowledge (commingling) did not occur.”