COLORADO SPRINGS — Thursday one of the owners of the Return to Nature Funeral Home where 190 bodies were found improperly stored will be in court.
Carie Hallford will be in court in Colorado Springs at 1:30. Today is a preliminary hearing. That's where a judge will decide if there is enough evidence to send this case to trial.
The bodies were found at the Return to Nature Funeral home in Penrose back in October. Carie and her husband Jon are accused of abusing corpses, stealing, laundering money, and forging documents.
According to arrest paper, bodies were stacked up on top of each other and some were not even in body bags. Jon had a preliminary hearing last week. A judge reduced his bond from $2 million to $100,000.
Judge William Moller said that was because he didn't think Hallford was a threat to the public he doesn't have a criminal history and that the $100,000 bond is still ten times the amount suggested by court guidelines.
It was an unexpected ruling for many family members of the alleged victims inside the courtroom.
Even though Jon’s bond was reduced, he remains in jail. The D-A's office says the judge may discuss Carie’s bond during today's hearing.
BACKGROUND
The funeral home was the center of an investigation after investigators said 190 bodies were found improperly stored. The two were arrested in Oklahoma earlier this month.
Return to Nature Funeral Home came under a multi-agency investigation in October following reports of a complaint about a foul odor in the area. Investigators said they found more than 150 bodies in various states of decomposition inside the building that were not properly stored.
In what was a multi-agency clean-up effort, coroner offices and the Colorado Bureau of Investigation worked tirelessly for a couple of weeks to remove the bodies from the building before the identification process could begin.
It was not until early November that the owners of the Return to Nature Funeral Home were arrested in Oklahoma. Jon and Carie Hallford were moved to El Paso County by late November where both appeared in court and had cash bonds set at $2 million. The Hallfords are facing hundreds of criminal charges for abuse of a corpse, fraud, and money laundering.
Following their arrests, News5's Eleanor Sheahan spoke with families who were victims of the funeral home.
WATCH: VICTIMS OF RETURN TO NATURE SHARE WHAT OWNER'S ARRESTS MEAN TO THEM
If you have been impacted by the Return to Nature Funeral Home, the FBI has recommended grief counseling.
WATCH: GRIEF COUNSELING AVAILABLE AFTER RETURN TO NATURE FUNERAL HOME INCIDENT
RELATED:
Coroner: Some remains in Return to Nature Funeral Home investigation were 'several years old'
Investigation into 115 bodies continues at Return to Nature Funeral Home in Penrose
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