Lawsuit filed by survivors after organ of deceased inadvertently returned to family

Nov. 6—The family of an organ donor whose brain was mistakenly returned to them in a box has filed a lawsuit against four businesses purportedly involved in the mix-up, including a Webb City funeral home.

A Kansas City law firm filed the suit Oct. 27 in the Circuit Court of St. Louis City on behalf of the family of Frederick D. Love Jr., who died Sept. 25, 2022, at his home in St. Charles County.

The plaintiffs — the deceased's widow, Glenda Love, and her four daughters and sons — allege negligence, fraudulent misrepresentation and interference with the family's right of sepulcher on the part of Baue Funeral Home in St. Charles, Simpson Funeral Home in Webb City, Mid-America Transplant Services in St. Louis and Time Critical Medical Transport in Battlefield.

Randy Nace, the Jasper County coroner and former employee of Simpson Funeral Home, also is named as a defendant, along with three employees of Baue Funeral Home and one at Mid-America Transplant Services. The Globe did not receive any response to efforts to reach him for comment.

The petition filed with the court states that Frederick Love Jr.'s body initially was taken to the St. Charles County medical examiner's office and was then turned over to Mid-America Transplant Services for the harvesting of organ tissue before being sent back to the medical examiner.

According to the lawsuit, Glenda Love was told that the medical examiner had a contract with Baue Funeral Home for free embalming and transportation to the funeral home of the family's choice if she signed a release. Baue Funeral Home took custody of the body from the medical examiner two days after his death, receiving the corpse and a red specimen bag that contained the deceased man's brain, according to the petition.

The family would later learn that a partial autopsy was performed and that the head had been embalmed separately from the rest of the body, even though the deceased's widow had not been informed that any autopsy would be necessary, according to the lawsuit.

Frederick Love was to be cremated following an open-casket funeral service that was to be handled by Simpson Funeral Home in Webb City, where the family had roots and two of the deceased's children resided in the area.

Once the embalming was completed at Baue Funeral Home, the brain was placed back into the specimen bag and the bag put in a cardboard box. An employee of the funeral home wrote in marker on the side of the box, "Fred Love Jr. to stay with deceased, do not open," and two red biohazard stickers were affixed to the box, according to the lawsuit.

Time Critical Medical Transport delivered the corpse and the box to Simpson Funeral Home, where they were received by Nace, who discussed funerary and cremation arrangements with the family.

The petition states that when the open-casket service was held Oct. 3 of last year, the family was appalled by the presentation of the body, according to the petition. The skin of the deceased had a bruised purple appearance, which the lawsuit attributes to "poor embalming practices," and his arms were positioned "unnaturally."

The family also found that rods used in the tissue donation process had been left in the body, adding to the purported rigid and unnatural appearance.

The family did not yet know that the deceased's brain had been removed and thought his entire remains had been cremated when Nace presented them with an urn three days later and a plastic sack containing an article of the man's clothing and the cardboard box.

The family placed the urn and sack in a daughter's SUV and took them back to Glenda Love's home in O'Fallon. The document states that the daughter was bothered by a pungent chemical odor along the way that caused a severe headache.

Due to the biohazard stickers, the family was reluctant to open the box without first knowing what it contained, and it was left unopened in a garage while they attempted to ascertain its contents through calls to Mid-America Transplant Services, its courier and Simpson Funeral Home.

The petition states that Nace called the family back after speaking with Baue Funeral Home and told them that the box apparently contained a portion of their loved one's brain. An employee of Baue subsequently informed them that "essentially you were given a box that contains Fred's brain by mistake." The employee then offered to cremate the brain separately but could not guarantee that it would not be completely incinerated, according to the lawsuit.

In addition to the negligence and fraudulent misrepresentation claims, the lawsuit alleges a violation of Missouri merchandising practices law by the two funeral homes and seeks a judgment in excess of $25,000.

"We hoped to eventually attain the justice they (the family) deserve," Steven Coronado, an attorney whose firm filed the suit, told the Globe.

Messages left with both funeral homes seeking their input for this article also went unanswered. A man who answered the phone at Time Critical Medical Transport and identified himself as the owner declined to comment.

Kevin Lee, chief executive officer for Midwest Transplant Services, responded to a voicemail message with the prepared statement: "It is heartbreaking that this family had such a traumatic experience following the death of their loved one. Mid-America Transplant has standard protocols that it consistently follows in coordinating the donation process while honoring the lives of the heroic individuals who say yes to organ and tissue donation. While Mid-America Transplant denies responsibility for the situation alleged, we hope this is resolved quickly so the family can heal."