HOUSTON – Asserting a funeral home in The Woodlands improperly handled their father’s remains, Harris County residents Doug, Richard, and Virginia McMinn have filed a lawsuit.
Recent court documents filed on Nov. 6 in the Harris County 270th District Court say the plaintiffs sought the services of SCI Texas Funeral Services, Inc., doing business as Forest Park The Woodlands Funeral Home, in regards to the interment of Robert E. McMinn.
The decedent selected to be buried in a wooden casket prior to his death on Dec. 23, 2010, but the suit alleges the defendant failed to warn the plaintiffs before his funeral and burial that such a casket is not designed to be placed in crypts or mausoleums.
The elder McMinn’s remains were temporarily put in an existing mausoleum while the respondent finished constructing a new mausoleum that would serve as the World War II veteran’s final resting place. Per the original petition, his children learned that his body had liquefied months later while in the care of Forest Park Cemetery.
Forest Park purportedly threatened the complainants by telling them that they were responsible for purchasing a new casket, tenting the entirety of the crypt, and for the quarantine measures implemented for the process of transferring their father’s remains to another crypt.
According to the suit, Doug McMinn learned that what happened to Robert E. McMinn was not an isolated incident.
Consequently, the plaintiffs seek unspecified monetary damages.
They are represented by attorney W. Clark Martin, IV of The Martin Law Firm, PLLC in Houston.
Harris County 270th District Court Case No. 2017-74516