Police are on the hunt for a former funeral home owner who allegedly kept a woman’s body in a hearse for two years and stashed the cremated remains of at least 30 people in a crawl space in his Denver, CO home, and – amazingly – this is not the first case of its kind.
The abandoned body of a 63-year-old woman and the cremated human remains were discovered on February 6 during a court-ordered eviction of a house rented by Miles Harford, the 33-year-old owner of Apollo Funeral and Cremation Services in the Denver suburbs.
The woman, who passed away in August of 2022, was found in the car. Police said Harford had been cooperating with investigators when the arrest warrant was announced last week.
However, he failed to turn himself into authorities, leading to a $2,000 Crimestoppers reward being offered for information leading to his arrest as authorities are unable to locate him.
READ MORE: ‘Horrific smell!’ More than 100 decomposing bodies discovered rotting inside funeral home
Harford, who is now missing, appeared to have experienced financial trouble in his business and was sometimes unable to complete cremations to provide remains to families for memorials.
In a shocking revelation for the families of the deceased, Harford may have given them another person’s ashes instead of the ashes of their loved ones, according to Denver Police Commander Matt Clark.
Temporary urns were found hidden in a small space in the house while a police officer watched as Harford’s things were taken away. But some of the plastic boxes for the ashes were empty. More urns were stashed in a lorry outside, and even more were in the funeral car where police found a lady’s body covered with blankets.
Harford is facing charges of abuse of a corpse, forgery of the death certificate and theft of the money paid for the woman’s cremation.
Further charges are possible as the investigation continues, Denver District Attorney Beth McCann said.
In October last year a funeral home – also in Colorado – was found stashing 189 decaying bodies and may have given family “cement” instead of ashes.
