Wrong Woman’s Body Cremated in La.

(MYFOX NATIONAL) – A Louisiana family is outraged after a major mix up left their loved one cremated instead of buried.

Ruby Joseph of Lafayette, La., died earlier this month. She and another woman, Rose Alex, were both in the morgue at Lafayette General Medical Center.

According to the hospital, the two were labeled correctly, but Kinchen Funeral Home and Raphael and Sons Funeral Home picked up the wrong bodies.

Joseph’s daughter discovered the mistake when she opened the casket to say a final goodbye.

That’s when she found the body inside wasn’t her mother’s — it was the body of Alex.

“Why didn’t [they] look at the tag before [they] cremated the body?” asked Chaka Joseph.

“The saddest thing about that is it was our mother’s casket, our mother’s dress that we chose for our mother, on another lady’s body,” Joseph’s son Kenneth said.

“[We] want to take them to a higher means. We want a lawsuit. That is entitled to us. It’s just not right,” he added.

Officials say the worker who picked up Joseph’s body did not check the wrist tag. He says when the hospital security guard had him sign an official release with the name of Ruby Joseph, he assumed he was leaving with the correct body.

Source: My Fox National