Inset: Kimberly Moore. Background: Michigan police and family members at the Hutchison Funeral Home in Detroit after Kimberly Moore was allegedly cremated by accident (WXYZ/YouTube).
A Michigan family says it was preparing to say its final goodbyes to a Detroit matriarch when it was confronted with a nightmare at the funeral home — a stranger’s body allegedly dressed in the mother‘s clothes, hair and makeup.
“This is not my momma,” daughter Bianca Robinson recounted telling a mortuary staffer about her mother, Kimberly Kaye Moore, who was being memorialized in the Motor City at the Hutchison Funeral Home.
Police stepped in last week after Moore’s family members showed up at the funeral home to protest and voice their outrage, according to local ABC affiliate WXYZ.
“It’s a lady in there with our mother’s dress on, and her hair on, and her makeup and it’s not our mother,” said Byron Moore, Kimberly Moore’s son, in an interview with WXYZ.
He and Robinson told the outlet that the Hutchison staffer apologized before revealing the horrifying truth: “We must’ve cremated her,” he told the family, according to Robinson.
Love true crime? Sign up for our newsletter, The Law&Crime Docket, to get the latest real-life crime stories delivered right to your inbox.
“He said, ‘I’m sorry,'” Robinson recounted. “He said, ‘Your mom must have been cremated when she first got here because it was two ladies that was here that came in when your mom came.'”
Kimberly Moore, a mother of five and grandmother of 28, died on Sept. 3. Her children were preparing for her viewing on Friday, Sept. 18, when they allegedly discovered that the woman inside what was supposed to be their mom’s body bag was not their mother. The mortuary employee who spoke to the family asked a question that raised suspicions, according to the family.
“When I came to put my mom nails and my lashes on, he was asking me like, ‘Is this your Mom?’ And I’m looking like, ‘you should know,'” Robinson recalled.
The employee then unzipped the body bag and Robinson said she knew immediately that something was wrong.
“He unzipped the bag, and when he unzipped the bag, I looked at the toe, and I was like it’s not a mole on her toe,” Robinson told WXYZ, explaining that her mom had a mole on her toe. “I said, ‘How do you make a mistake like that?'”
Another family member, Christopher Moore, told WXYZ that the funeral home later blamed a possible identification mix-up.
“They said the toe tag … they think the toe tag got wet and fell off and that’s how her body got mixed up with somebody else’s body,” he alleged.
Kimberly Moore was scheduled to be cremated on Saturday after her loved ones had an opportunity to view her body Friday.
“We don’t have a viewing. What do we have?” Robinson asked. “We don’t even have her ashes! Somebody please tell us something.”
Detroit police were called Friday and stood by as tensions erupted outside the funeral home, with officers there to keep the peace while the grieving family protested, WXYZ reports. No arrests were reported.
The funeral home sent a statement to local NBC affiliate WDIV, saying:
We are heartbroken and deeply sorry for what Ms. Moore’s family has experienced. We are aware of the family’s concerns and we will continue to communicate with them honestly and respectfully. We have launched our own internal review to determine exactly what happened and we will deal with it accordingly. Out of respect for Ms. Moore and her family, we ask that their privacy be honored during this time. We will share more when we can.
“We’re investigating it,” Joseph Hutchison Jr., the funeral home’s vice president of operations, told WXYZ.
Hutchison spokesperson Mario Morrow said that if an investigation determines the funeral home was responsible, it would make the family whole, according to the outlet.
The post Funeral home dressed stranger up in dead woman’s clothes, hair and makeup for public viewing before daughter notices mole is missing and says, ‘This is not my momma’: Family first appeared on Law & Crime.
