Authorities in Ciudad Juárez have arrested two men connected to a crematorium where 383 bodies were found piled up and left to decompose. The owner of Plenitud crematorium, José Luis Arellano Cuarón, and his employee, Facundo Martínez Robledo, were detained on Sunday and placed in preventive detention pending a court hearing scheduled for Friday.
The disturbing discovery was made last Thursday after citizens reported foul odors emanating from the facility in the Granjas Polo Gamboa neighborhood. According to Chihuahua Attorney General César Jáuregui Moreno, the bodies were haphazardly stacked in five or six rooms and in the yard of the crematorium.
Investigators believe some bodies had been at the location for up to five years. The remains included four minors, including two babies. All bodies had been embalmed, suggesting they had been processed through funeral homes before being sent to the crematorium.
The facility provided cremation services to six funeral homes in Ciudad Juárez. Authorities suspect the crematorium charged for services it never performed, instead allowing bodies to accumulate. Families were reportedly given “other material” instead of authentic ashes of their loved ones.
If convicted on all charges related to improper handling of cadavers, the two men face between 8 and 19 years in prison. The investigation will also examine whether other parties, including regulatory officials responsible for facility inspections, bear responsibility.
This is not the first such incident in Ciudad Juárez. According to Marcelo Ruiz of the Ciudad Juárez Funeral Homes Union, a similar case during the COVID pandemic resulted in the discovery of 63 decomposing bodies at another crematorium.
The attorney general stated that investigations will focus on providing dignity to the remains, identifying them, and determining their proper disposition according to relatives’ wishes.
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