The funeral home owner who was accused of hiding a woman’s corpse in the back of a hearse for over a year and then improperly stashing the cremated remains of at least 30 people pleaded guilty in court on Monday.
Miles Harford’s guilty plea to counts of corpse abuse and theft in Denver, Colorado, follows years of other gruesome funeral home cases in the state. In one unrelated case, the owners were accused of storing nearly 200 bodies in a decrepit building and giving families fake cremated remains.
Harford, 34, faced a dozen counts of forgery, theft and abuse of a corpse, which prosecutors described as treating bodies or remains “in a way that would outrage normal family sensibilities.”
The plea agreement dismissed the rest of the charges, but the judge said the agreement requires that all victims be named within the two charges Harford pleaded guilty to and that he would be liable for restitution, including for the dismissed counts.
Harford was arrested a year ago after the body of a woman named Christina Rosales, who died of Alzheimer’s at the age of 63, was found in the back of a hearse, covered in blankets.
The cremated remains of other people who died from 2012 to 2021 were also found stashed throughout Harford’s rental property, including in the crawlspace.
Harford is represented by lawyers from the state public defender’s office, which does not comment on its cases to the media.
There were no other details in the court hearing on the charges, including how much money was taken from victims or how corpses were abused.
The funeral home cases over the years prompted lawmakers to pass sweeping new regulations of the funeral home industry in Colorado last year, which previously had little oversight.
Harford’s sentencing is scheduled for June 9.
