Shouldn’t this funeral director be arrested? *MNHQ warning - distressing content*

[MissyB1]

I will post the link (hopefully works). Surely there must be something she could be charged with? And her “business” needs closing down! It’s just beyond words!
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c4gjr0ylenzo

Our sanitised handling of the dead is fairly recent. Culturally it hasn’t always been the way. Victorians posed bodies for photographs. Keeping the baby’s remains in a home environment, baby bouncers and cartoons, could be seen as caring.
We all have different associations- some expect the body dressed in Sunday best, others naked as they arrived, while some might be thinking of comfortable bedtime attire. I don’t want to be in a wired bra in my coffin, for example.

I’m not saying it’s fine, but it’s cultural rather than anything else.

Yanbu. It's just awful. She appears to have set up as a funeral director for personal reasons.

The article says there's no law about how dead bodies should be stored, only a code of practice, so I'm not sure what she could be arrested for.

My thought on reading it was frankly that she needs psychiatric help. It reminded me of Dennis Nilsen, posing dead bodies around the house and watching TV with them. Obviously unlike Nilsen she hasn't murdered anyone in order to do this, but it's not the behaviour of a mentally healthy person.

I don’t think it’s cultural, I think she sounds unwell. Her own baby was stillborn, and now she takes the bodies of babies and sits them in bouncers in her house to watch cartoons?

Yes but the issue is, she has done this with her “clients” without permission.

It’s like a horror film. That poor mum. Jesus.

Fron the article, it seems she hasn't done anything illegal. Which is a surprise, but the industry seems to be unregulated.

I work in the NHS, in a related area, and anything like this is very closely regulated checked, inspected and audited. I’m amazed the regulations don’t also cover funeral directors.

I can't believe the industry is so unregulated. Those poor parents. It's absolutely incredible to me that no crime was committed. I could set up as a 'funeral director' tomorrow and just store the bodies in my living room apparently. It's got to be one of the oldest professions too so it's not like regulations haven't kept up with a new industry.

Yes.

This is all kinds of fucked up! Imagine seeing your dead baby like that, and another dead baby laid out on the sofa. How distressing.

Whilst you'd want them handled with care and compassion, this is just bloody odd and macabre.

I should think the woman is mentally unwell.

Those poor parents they’ll not get that smell out their head. This wasn’t the service they expect and she has made a horrific time worse for them. She needs help.

For your baby to die is a horrific thing to go through as a parent. To then find them treated like this is disgusting and violating. The poor parents must be traumatised.

Jeez. The funeral director needs professional help. That’s so messed up

I think there is a difference for parents to have the opportunity to have a baby’s body at home with cold cot etc before the funeral compared to a funeral director to do it. The funeral director appears to be mentally unwell after the still birth of her baby

She lost her baby after her partner attacked her. She does need help, and the families were very shocked and distressed by it. It sounds as though the point of Florries Army was a very personal, not sterile, experience though.

Trigger warning- be very mindful before you go there but…. Florrie’s Army FB page shares explicit photos of very prem, born sleeping babies.

This is a very specific service, they were fundraising for a building. I think it’s a bit more than it seems.

Yes this seems to be the issue - and that really needs addressing!! But at the very least there must be a way to shut her business down.

What a weirdo

I can definitely see that some parents might want their babies to go to somewhere with a less clinical feel to it. But that should never be somewhere with dogs and cats. And the parents should have been told the situation right from the off. I cannot imagine the horror of walking in, being told “come in, we’re watching pj masks” and seeing my baby in a bouncer.

Why? If she hasn't done anything "wrong"?

I can’t imagine the distress the families have experienced, and there will be other families no doubt who used this company, who may be wondering if she treated their babies inappropriately. I agree she must be mentally unwell.

It's a very disturbing story. The other funeral director involved also has questions to answer. Why did he release the bodies to this woman and where did he think she was taking them? If he was working with her he had a duty of care to ensure she was being professional. Unregulated or not, no one would think keeping bodies in this way by a funeral director was acceptable.

Because the parents didn’t consent for their babies to be in this woman’s own home, and for them to be used as some kind of toy by the business owner!

It won’t be long before this becomes a health issue. Yes, Victorians kept their dead at home, but I’m fairly sure they didn’t have to wait a couple of weeks before the funeral and burial (or cremation nowadays) could be arranged. Dead bodies decay at room temperature. Her house must have smelt surly?