Scores of Decomposing Corpses Found at Crematory

Investigators scouring the woods behind a crematory in rural Georgia found scores of decomposing corpses Saturday, including at least 93 intact bodies and other remains scattered along the ground.

“You’d walk an area and see a skull here, a leg bone there, a rib cage over there. It was very gruesome,” said John Bankhead, a spokesman for the Georgia Bureau of Investigation.

The operator of the Tri-State Crematory, Brent Marsh, was arrested in Walker County, in the northwest corner of Georgia. He was charged with theft by deception, a felony; authorities allege that he contracted with funeral homes in three states to cremate bodies but instead dumped the corpses in the crematory, in storage sheds or in the woods on his 16-acre property. Marsh had been running the crematory for several years on behalf of his parents, who are prominent civic activists in the community.

Some of the bodies had apparently arrived within the last few weeks; they were clad in hospital gowns, with identification tags still wrapped around their toes. Others had clearly been there for years.

One body, so decomposed it looked like a mummy, was laid out in a blue funeral suit in the box used for cremation. Other corpses were in caskets. A few had been buried in the crematory grounds.

“The worst horror movie you’ve ever seen--imagine that 10 times worse,” Walker County Coroner Dewayne Wilson told the local media. “That’s what I’m dealing with.”

The scene, about 85 miles northwest of Atlanta, was so overwhelming that Georgia Gov. Roy Barnes declared a state of emergency in Walker County and sent in dozens of state investigators. By late Saturday, they had identified 13 corpses, discovered 80 others intact and collected uncounted numbers of bones.

“And this is just what they can see,” said Lisa Ray of the Georgia Emergency Management Agency. “They haven’t even started excavating.”

More than 100 investigators were to comb the grounds throughout the weekend, while grief counselors waited in a church to counsel families whose loved ones had been sent to the crematory in the small, unincorporated community of Noble, near the town of Rock Springs.

Frantic to find out the fate of their relatives, family members bombarded funeral homes with questions Saturday, venting fury and horror. “I’ve got three lines holding right now, and we’ve been flooded with calls all day,” reported one funeral home director in Rossville, Ga.

He could give few satisfactory answers.

While several of the corpses were easily identified from toe tags, many more were decomposed to bare bones. Authorities believe all of the remains come from bodies brought to the site for cremation.

It is unclear exactly what relatives received from the crematory in lieu of ashes. “Wood chips, possibly,” Bankhead said.

The probe of the Tri-State Crematory, which serves northwest Georgia and northeast Alabama and southeast Tennessee, began Friday, when the Environmental Protection Agency in Atlanta received an anonymous call complaining about a stench from the property. EPA investigators visited the site and found a human skull. They then called in local investigators, who found body after body, working late into the evening.

The discovery stunned residents of Walker County--and not only because it was so grisly.

Ray and Clara Marsh, who have owned the Tri-State Crematory for about 30 years, are well respected in the community, which one local described as “like every other small Southern town”--quiet and slow-paced and friendly, “with everything as it was a long time ago.”

Clara Marsh, a retired teacher, is well-known for her work combating drug abuse in the schools and recently was honored as Walker County’s citizen of the year. This year, Ray Marsh served on a panel of the region’s most prominent citizens. And both are active volunteers.

A woman answering the phone at the Marsh home Saturday said they would have no comment. But plenty of acquaintances stepped forward to speak on their behalf.

“They’re just all-around stellar citizens,” said Stan Porter, chairman-elect of the Walker County Chamber of Commerce.

“This doesn’t make a bit of sense,” added Randy Bryant, a member of the local school board.

Authorities said the Marshes, who are in their 60s, turned management of the crematory over to their son around 1996. That is when the corpses allegedly began to pile up, Bankhead said.

But Bill McGill, a former county coroner, suggested that problems with the crematory stretch back earlier. He said that he repeatedly complained to state officials in the early 1990s that the Tri-State Crematory was not licensed and did not have a state-licensed funeral director on the premises, as required. What’s more, he said it did not get permits for each cremation, as mandated by state law.

McGill said state inspectors told him they could look only at licensed facilities--a Catch-22 that left him fuming but helpless.

“I pushed it and pushed it as far as I could,” said McGill, who retired in 2000. “I don’t know what kind of pull [the Marshes] had . . . but I couldn’t get anything done.”

Authorities said Brent Marsh has been cooperating with the investigation. He could face up to five years behind bars for each count of theft by deception, a felony. So far he has been charged with five counts, but officials expect more.

The elder Marshes have also been cooperating fully, turning over all their crematory records. No decision has yet been made on whether they too will face charges.

“The district attorney is still assessing that situation,” Ray said.