Grieving pet owners in Pennsylvania were none too happy to find out that the urn in their living room did not contain the remains of their beloved Sir Fluffletons.
As it turned out, Vereb Funeral Home's pet cremation services involved raking in a whopping $657,517 for 6,500 cremations (that's over $100 a pet if you're keeping score). Instead of cremations, they would throw the animal in the trash and hand the owners an urn full of some "unknown" animal's ashes.
The owner of the funeral home, Patrick Vereb, was arrested for the bait and switch.
Attorney General Dave Sunday said,
This case is disturbing, and will cause devastation and heartache for many Pennsylvanians. Our pets are members of our families, and this defendant betrayed and agonized pet owners who entrusted him to provide dignified services for their beloved cats and dogs. I commend our investigative team for a comprehensive review of voluminous records which uncovered this long-running pattern of theft and deception.
The AG's office has set up a website to engage with the thousands of Pennsylvania residents who were duped by Vereb.
Vereb faces multiple felony counts of theft by deception, receiving stolen property, and deceptive business practices.
And whatever the sentence he gets handed down, no one can say he didn't urn it.
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