MEMPHIS, Tenn. – She lost her baby and to add to the grief, she said the funeral home lost his body.
A Memphis mother said she is planning to sue.
“I got to hold him, kiss him, look at him,” she told WREG. “He had eyes, arms and legs. He wasn’t a fetus; he was a baby. He just didn’t make it because he was small.”
She didn’t want to be identified but wants people to know what happened to her could happen to you.
Her first baby, Jual, was born premature, weighing one pound one ounce.
He didn’t make it through the night, so she planned a burial service for him the next week.
That was until MJ Edwards Funeral home called her to come to their offices immediately.
“When I got there, she said they don’t know where his remains are the day before the burial,” she said.
Her baby’s body was missing.
She said they told her they could do a memorial service without the body or wait to see if the body turned up.
“I feel like they treated him any kind of way because he was small,” she said. “You wouldn’t have lost a 50- or 18-year-old.”
She went to the hospital where she found proof that on Aug. 24 at 3 a.m., the funeral home picked his body up but what happened after that is a mystery.
James Sanders is representing the mother in this case.
“Part of the problem is she doesn’t know had happened. There has been no explanation of any kind other than merely saying we lost the body,” he said.
They’re suing the funeral home for negligence.
The firm representing MJ Edwards says while it’s the prerogative of the family to share this story publicly; they will keep the bond of confidentiality with the family.
The young mother told WREG no amount of money will change what she’s been through.
“Next year on Aug. 23, to me, that’s going to be his first birthday,” she said. “I’m not going to be able to go to the gravesite to visit because I don’t know where he is.”
