Mattapan Funeral Director Faces 278 Charges
A former Mattapan funeral home director is accused of keeping human remains and cremated remains in storage lockers and stealing $150,000 from customers. On Wednesday afternoon, a Suffolk County grand jury indicted Joseph V. O’Donnell on 278 charges, according to a statement from District Attorney Dan Conley’s office.
According to Conley’s office, O’Donnell let his professional license lapse in 2008. From 2009 to 2013, when he lost his funeral home to foreclosure, O’Donnell performed 201 illegal funerals.
According to investigators, O’Donnell kept 12 bodies and 32 sets of cremated remains in a Weymouth storage facility. Another 45 sets of cremated remains were found in a Somerville storage facility. Eleven of the 12 bodies were identified as individuals who passed away after O’Donnell lost his license.
“Disturbingly, authorities believe O’Donnell provided the families of eight of those 11 decedents with ashes belonging to someone other than their loved one,’’ read the DA’s statement. “Two sets of ashes were scattered by family members, meaning only six could be recovered.’’
O’Donnell also took money from 31 elderly clients who pre-paid for funeral services, according to Conley’s office.
“The price of those contracts was as much as $7,000, totaling $149,096.22, and should have been placed in a trust for use when the client passed away,’’ read the DA’s statement. “Instead, when asked by investigators where this money was, O’Donnell allegedly said, ‘It’s all gone.’’’
Two of the families that paid for the “pre-need’’ services realized they had been robbed when they discovered O’Donnell’s funeral home was closed.
O’Donnell’s been held in court custody since April 10, when he was arraigned on larceny charges. He’s due in Dorchester court Thursday for an administrative hearing on those earlier charges.
The Wednesday indictment included the following charges:
∙ 12 counts of improper disposal of human remains for allegedly using a Weymouth storage facility to hold decomposing human bodies entrusted to his care
18 counts of fiduciary embezzlement and one count of fiduciary embezzlement by scheme for using funeral pre-payments for his own purposes instead of keeping them in a trust under the contract he signed.
∙ 11 counts of larceny over $250 from a person over 60, six counts of larceny over $250 from a disabled person, one count of larceny over $250, and one count of larceny over $250 by scheme for the theft of those funeral pre-payments.
∙ 11 counts of larceny over $250 for failing to have 11 of the Weymouth bodies buried or cremated after taking payment to do so (one body cannot be charged at this time because it has not been identified and no records have been located showing that O’Donnell accepted payment for its burial or cremation).
∙ Four counts each of statutory forgery and statutory uttering for falsifying signatures on two medical examiner’s certificates and two death certificates and then presenting those official state documents as genuine.
∙ Two counts each of common-law forgery and common-law uttering for falsifying signatures on two certificates of cremation, which are not state documents but rather records created by crematory employees.
∙ Four counts of returning a false death certificate; and · 201 counts of acting as a funeral director without a license.
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