In brief
Derrick Johnson buried his mother’s ashes, unknowingly involved in a scandal where hundreds of bodies were improperly handled at the 'Return to Nature' funeral home. Post-FBI investigation, his mother's body was confirmed among the compromised remains, prompting legal actions against the owners and leading him to confront his grief in new, painful ways. As he prepares to speak at the sentencing of those responsible, Johnson grapples with trauma, justice, and the loss of trust that follows such horrors.
COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. (AP) — Derrick Johnson buried his mother’s ashes beneath a golden dewdrop tree with purple blossoms at his home on Maui’s Haleakalā Volcano, fulfilling her wish of a final resting place looking over her grandchildren.
Then the FBI called.
It was Feb. 4, 2024, and Johnson was teaching an eighth-grade gym class.
“‘Are you the son of Ellen Lopes?’” a woman asked, Johnson recalled in an interview with The Associated Press.
There had been an incident, and an FBI agent would fly out to explain, the caller said. Then she asked: “‘Did you use Return to Nature for a funeral home?’”
Johnson felt nauseated and his chest constricted, forcing the breath from his lungs. He pushed himself out of the building as another teacher heard his cries and came running.
Two FBI agents visited Johnson the following week, confirming his mother’s body was among 189 that Return to Nature’s owners, Jon and Carie Hallford, had stashed in a Colorado building between 2019 and Oct. 4, 2023, when the bodies were found.
It was one of the largest discoveries of decaying bodies at a funeral home in the U.S. Lawmakers overhauled the state’s lax funeral home regulations. And besides handing over fake ashes to grieving families, the Hallfords also admitted to defrauding the federal government out of nearly $900,000 in pandemic-era aid for small businesses.
They were arrested in Oklahoma in November 2023 and charged with abusing nearly 200 corpses.
Johnson promised himself that he would speak at Hallford’s sentencing and ask for the maximum penalty.
“When the judge passes out how long you’re going to jail, and you walk away in cuffs,” he said, “you’re gonna hear me.”
Johnson grew up with his mother in an affordable-housing complex in Colorado Springs, where she knew everyone.
“She lied to me over the phone. She lied to me through email. She lied to me in person,” Johnson told the AP.
As he prepares for the sentencing and confronts the trauma, Johnson reflects on the lost trust and the profound anxiety stemming from the horrifying discovery.
