Funeral home denies mistreating bodies

FALLS CHURCH, Va., July 3 (UPI) -- Lawyers for a Virginia funeral home deny bodies were mishandled there, insisting National Funeral Home in Falls Church broke no laws.

Relatives charge the funeral home -- a regional embalming and storage facility for the Service Corporation of America chain, based in Houston -- stored bodies in an unrefrigerated garage and in hallways, The Washington Post reported. Steven Napper, a Maryland state trooper turned embalmer, photographed bodies in the garage and on top of biohazard boxes.

The bodies included those of military veterans being prepared for burial at Arlington National Cemetery.

Lawyers, in a letter to the Virginia board regulating funeral homes, acknowledged the garage was occasionally used for storage during busy times. But they said bodies were kept there only briefly.

State law does not require embalmed bodies to be refrigerated, the funeral home said.