Nine grieving children discovered that a New York funeral home had sent their mother’s body to a family in Guatemala after coincidentally finding a TikTok of the shocked recipients.
Carmen Maldonado died two days after her 96th birthday in May, telling relatives she wanted to be buried next to her husband in Ecuador.
Her family thought her body was still at the Rivera Funeral Home in Queens when they saw a Guatemalan news report of a young widow wondering why an old woman was lying in a coffin that was supposed to hold the body of her 38-year-old husband .
Carmen’s family is now suing the funeral home after recovering the elderly woman’s body from the widow and transferring it to the South American country, another 1,500 miles south.
“They kept saying it was a ‘little mistake,’” son Carlos Maldonado said. “They made us feel like trading or having the wrong bodies wasn’t important to them.”
Carmen Maldonado was a New York mother of nine and grandmother of 30, whose dying wish was to be buried next to her husband in her native Ecuador
Her children were stunned by the coincidence when they saw the TikTok of a Guatemalan news report, which revealed that her body had been delivered to an unrelated family 1,500 miles north.
The family’s relatives in Ecuador expected to receive the elderly woman’s body for viewing shortly after her death on May 18.
But eight days later, her body arrived in Guatemala, where widow Leonor Valencia expected the same funeral home to send the body of husband Elder Emilio Garcia, who had died suddenly while working as a waiter in New York.
Local TV reporter Alcibiades Onofre spoke to the mother of two and posted his report on TikTok, where it was noticed by Carmen’s children.
“The funeral home led them to believe that their mother’s body was still in the building in Queens, and they made excuses as to why there was a delay in transporting her to Ecuador,” Rizzuto said.
“Although the TikTok indicated that the woman in Guatemala was Carmen Maldonado, it was hard to believe because they received different information from the funeral home.
‘The funeral home said to daughter Rosa: no, we have your mother here. And they denied it.
“But when they showed up the next day and showed them the video, the funeral home admitted they had made a mistake.”
Carmen’s youngest son Manuel Minchala, 51, flew to Guatemala, where he received little help from authorities.
“They tried to bury my mother in Guatemala, and I begged the people there,” he said.
“I had to deal with the health department, the police, and a lot of big, big processes to export the body to another country.”
“I couldn’t believe this could cause such confusion,” said his sister Rosa Sicha. ‘I started crying and was incredibly upset.’
It took more than two weeks before the family could get her body from Guatemala
“They kept saying it was a ‘little mistake,’” son Carlos Maldonado said. “They made us feel like exchanging or having the wrong bodies wasn’t important to them.”
Guatemalan widow Leonor Valencia expected the same funeral home to send the body of husband Elder Emilio Garcia, who had died suddenly while working as a waiter in New York.
The New York Department of Consumer and Worker Protection had sued the funeral home’s parent company, RG Ortiz, a month earlier after discovering that 74 customers had filed complaints against the funeral home over the past six years.
In August, the company agreed to pay $604,000 in restitution after admitting to presenting bodies in “unacceptable conditions,” refusing to tell grieving families where their relatives’ remains were, and misleading families about prices.
“Money will never heal the wounds inflicted by RG Ortiz’s behavior, but we are proud to hold this company accountable and ensure justice for our neighbors,” department commissioner Vilda Vera Mayuga said in a statement.
It was June 10 before Carmen’s youngest son was able to get his mother’s body from Guatemala and put it on a plane to her native Ecuador.
“The hands of the body, the skin fell off, so they had to wrap them in Saran wrap,” Rizzuto told the NY Post.
“I can’t imagine how the family feels, or what the family went through when they saw that.”
Now the family has filed a lawsuit seeking unspecified damages for “great mental anguish, severe anxiety, psychological distress, nervous shock and impairment of peace and happiness.”
“Why did the funeral home lie to us?” asked Manuel, 51. “My mother was in Guatemala for 16 days.”
‘It was all about money. Not even an animal can make such a mistake.’