Son Discovers Mother Among 189 Rotting Corpses at Colorado Funeral Home
Derrick Johnson had fulfilled his mother's final wish, burying what he believed were her ashes beneath a golden dewdrop tree at his Maui home. The serene resting place overlooked her grandchildren, providing comfort after her passing. Then, the FBI called.
It was February 4, 2024, and Johnson was teaching an eighth-grade gym class when the phone rang. A woman's voice asked, "Are you the son of Ellen Lopes?" She explained there had been an incident, and an FBI agent would fly out to provide details. Then came the chilling suggestion: "Did you use Return to Nature for a funeral home? You should probably google them."
Horror Unfolds in a Weight Room
In the school weight room, Johnson typed "Return to Nature" into his cellphone. Dozens of news reports flashed across his screen in a devastating blur. Hundreds of bodies stacked upon each other. Inches of decomposition fluid. Swarms of insects. Traumatized investigators. A governor declaring a state of emergency.
Johnson felt nauseated as his chest tightened, forcing breath from his lungs. He stumbled out of the building, his cries bringing another teacher running to his aid.
Two FBI agents visited Johnson the following week, confirming his worst fears. His mother's body was among 189 that Return to Nature's owners, Jon and Carie Hallford, had stashed in a Colorado building between 2019 and October 4, 2023, when authorities made the gruesome discovery.
One of America's Largest Funeral Home Scandals
This represented one of the largest discoveries of decaying bodies at a U.S. funeral home. The revelation prompted Colorado lawmakers to overhaul the state's notoriously lax funeral home regulations. Beyond handing fake ashes to grieving families, the Hallfords admitted to defrauding the federal government of nearly $900,000 in pandemic-era small business aid.
Even as their bills went unpaid, authorities said the couple purchased Tiffany jewelry, luxury cars, and laser-body sculpting treatments, pocketing approximately $130,000 that clients had paid for cremations.
Arrested in Oklahoma in November 2023, the Hallfords faced charges of abusing nearly 200 corpses. Hundreds of families learned from officials that the ashes they had ceremonially spread or kept close weren't actually their loved ones' remains. The bodies of mothers, fathers, grandparents, children, and babies had moldered in a room-temperature Colorado building.
A Mother's Final Journey Betrayed
Jon and Carie Hallford operated as a husband-and-wife team, advertising "green burials" without embalming alongside cremation services at their Return to Nature funeral home in Colorado Springs. Carie typically greeted grieving families, guiding them through their loved ones' final arrangements, while Jon remained less visible.
Johnson called the funeral home in early February 2023, the week his mother died. Carie Hallford assured him she would take excellent care of his mother. Days later, she handed Johnson a blue box containing a zip-tied plastic bag filled with gray powder, claiming those were his mother's ashes.
"She lied to me over the phone. She lied to me through email. She lied to me in person," Johnson said bitterly.
The following day, the box lay surrounded by flowers and photos of Ellen Marie Shriver-Lopes at a memorial service at a Holiday Inn in Colorado Springs. Johnson sprinkled rose petals over it as a preacher intoned: "Ashes to ashes, dust to dust."
Surveillance Reveals Gruesome Reality
On September 9, 2023, surveillance footage showed a man appearing to be Jon Hallford entering a Return to Nature building in Penrose, outside Colorado Springs, according to an arrest affidavit.
Camera footage inside revealed a body lying on a gurney wearing a diaper and hospital socks. The man flipped it onto the floor, then "appeared to wipe the remaining decomposition from the gurney onto other bodies in the room" before wheeling what appeared to be two more bodies into the building.
In a text to his wife, Hallford wrote, "while I was making the transfer, I got people juice on me," according to court testimony.
The Investigation Unfolds
Detective Sgt. Michael Jolliffe and Laura Allen, the county's deputy coroner, stood outside the Penrose building on October 3, 2023, according to a 50-page arrest affidavit. A sign on the door read "Return to Nature Funeral Home" with a disconnected phone number listed.
Cracked concrete and yellow grass encircled the building. A shabby hearse with expired registration sat at the back. A window air-conditioner hummed persistently.
Someone had reported a rank smell emanating from the building the previous day. One neighbor thought it came from a septic tank; another said her daughter's dog always headed toward the building whenever off-leash. The odor resembled rancid manure or rotting fish, overwhelming anyone downwind.
Jolliffe and Allen spotted a dark stain under the door and on the building's stucco exterior that resembled fluids they had seen during investigations involving decaying bodies. But the windows were covered, preventing them from seeing inside.
Inside the House of Horrors
Donning protective suits, gloves, boots, and respirators, investigators entered the 2,500-square-foot building on October 5, 2023. Inside, they discovered a large bone grinder and next to it a bag of Quikcrete that investigators suspected was used to mimic ashes.
Bodies were stacked in nearly a dozen rooms, including the bathroom, sometimes so high they blocked doorways. There were 189 in total. Some had decayed for years, others several months. Many were in body bags, some wrapped in sheets and duct tape. Others were half-exposed on gurneys or in plastic totes, or lay with no covering at all.
Investigators believed the Hallfords were experimenting with water cremation, which can dissolve a body in several hours. Swarms of bugs and maggots infested the space. Body bags were filled with fluid, some having ripped open. Five-gallon buckets had been placed to catch the leaks. Removal teams "trudged through layers of human decomposition on the floor."
Identifying the Victims
Investigators identified bodies using fingerprints, hospital bracelets, and medical implants. One body was supposed to be buried in Pikes Peak National Cemetery. Investigators exhumed the wooden casket at the burial site of the U.S. Army veteran, who served in Vietnam and the Persian Gulf.
Inside was a woman's deteriorated body, wrapped in duct tape and plastic sheets. The veteran's body was discovered in the Penrose building, covered in maggots.
Psychological Aftermath for Families
Following the FBI's call, Johnson, 45, suffered panic attacks and promised himself he would speak at the Hallfords' sentencing, asking for the maximum penalty. "When the judge passes out how long you're going to jail, and you walk away in cuffs," he vowed, "you're gonna hear me."
For months, Johnson obsessed over the case, reading dozens of news reports, often glued to his phone until one of his children interrupted him to play. When he shut his eyes, he imagined trudging through the building with "maggots, flies, centipedes. There's rats, they're feasting."
He asked a preacher if his mother's soul had been trapped there, receiving reassurance it hadn't. When an episode of the zombie show The Walking Dead came on television, he broke down completely.
Seeking Justice and Healing
Johnson began seeing a therapist and was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder. He joined Zoom meetings with other victims' relatives as their numbers grew from dozens to hundreds.
After Lopes' body was identified, Johnson flew to Colorado in March 2024, where his mother's remains lay in a brown box in a crematorium. "I don't think you blame me, but I still want to tell you I'm sorry," he recalled saying, placing his hand on the box. Then Lopes' body was loaded into the cremator, and Johnson pushed the button.
Johnson has slowly improved with therapy, engaging more with his students and children. He began practicing speaking at the Hallfords' sentencings during therapy sessions. Closing his eyes, he envisioned standing before the judge—and the Hallfords.
"Justice is the part that is missing from this whole equation," he reflected. "Maybe somehow this justice frees me. And then there's part of me that's scared it won't, because it probably won't."
Jon Hallford will be sentenced Friday, facing between 30 to 50 years in prison, with Carie Hallford scheduled for sentencing in April after a judge accepted their plea agreements in December. Attorneys for Jon and Carie Hallford did not respond to an Associated Press request for comment.
