On November 23, 1986, the nearly century-old facility burned to the ground after Davids employees somehow shoved 19 bodies into each of the ovens at once. A proliferation of people and cars had led to the citys signature smog, and gridlock gripped the streets. And that was enough to spur the fire department into action, stopping by for an administrative inspection of the premises and, upon opening the oven, being greeted with the sight of a wall of bodiesand a partially burned foot falling to the floor in front of the chief. Presumably, their concerts were strictly dance-free, Many interesting behind-the-scenes bits have happened during the 20 years of telling tales about our favorite trailer-park residents, The assailant couldnt steal her good mood. Although he began his cremations in mid-1982, he didnt start his business on paper until 1984, doubling the number of bodies he cremated each year. To many who knew him, David Sconce was the model youth, a one-time defensive back for his father at Azusa-Pacific with a surfers wave of blond hair. The ovens went from barely used to running for upwards of 18 hours a day to handle the load of up to a hundred bodies in storage, awaiting their final disposition in David Sconces flames. In February of 1985, Sconce sent another one of his thugs, this time an 245-pound ex-football player, to beat up a rival crematorium owner Timothy Waters, who had been threatening to spill allof the tea on Sconces operation. His business plan was simple enough: Sconce would obtain a license from the Department of Health to operate a crematorium. having his employees rough up three rival morticians. All the work of a ruthless mortician who would stop at nothing to corner the market on death in the City of Angels. At the time, brains could sold for about $80, hearts for $95, lungs for $60. The sole purpose of the company was to facilitate Davids already-flourishing side gig trafficking organs hed removed from soon-to-be-cremated bodies. Better run your business honestly, because you dont want the media to mention you alongside thatguy! By all accounts a beefy man with a love for money, when other options ran dry for him his parents decided to bring him into the family business. Perhaps David Sconces most effective legacy in the funeral industry is being the boogeyman; the kind of monster that no funeral home director would ever want to be compared to. In 1985 Estephan and Cindy Strunk (Cindy) were separated. 5-7 pounds of ashes for men, 3-4 pounds of ashes for women. Belgrade, Kragujevac) Enquiry type Country. It was time for him to learn a trade, they believed, and what better business than that of the dead? The mortuaries, in turn, would charge customers anywhere from $265 to $1,000 for cremation services. There was no information about how much more money they had made selling parts on the black market, because people in those circles arent that keen on paper trails. However, theres something else that can mimic digoxin in the bloodstream: oleander, one of the most common and most poisonous trees in Southern California. At the time, the charges wouldnt stick because three toxicologists couldnt agree that oleander was the cause of death. A573819 (the funeral home case). And Sconce would charge the funeral homes the low, low price of $55 per body, half of what his competitors offered. The only family member accused in the strong-arm tactics allegedly used against competitors, he is charged among other things with plotting to kill the prosecuting attorney, Walt Lewis. In May 1988, David Sconce, Jerry Sconce, and Laurieanne Lamb Sconce were together charged with 67 felony and misdemeanor counts, including, the Los Angeles Times reported, illegally harvesting eyes, hearts, lungs, and brains for sale to a scientific supply company, conducting mass cremations, falsifying death certificates, and embezzling funeral trust account funds. David was also charged separately with assaulting three morticians who voiced suspicions about the familys cremation operation.. Before the Civil War, most Americans died at home and were buried nearby, often in the local churchyard. The insane true story of the 1980s mortician who turned his familys funeral home into a nightmare cremation factorypulling gold teeth, harvesting organs, and threatening anyone who got in his way. Before the fire that forced the Lamb Funeral Home to move its crematory services off-site, the record was 18 bodies in the oven at once. Sconce had bulldozed the front- and backyards of the house before leaving town, but he hadnt completely covered his tracks. Things that are acceptable to remove are medical devices, such as pacemakers, that may explode in the heat of the flames, and a form existed authorizing the crematory to remove exactly those items. You can find him being mistaken on Google Search for a hockey player whose name is one letter off from his, or you can find him on Twitter. You can toss money at this site and its author on Ko-Fi, Patreon, or just through PayPal. By all accounts a beefy man with a love for money, when other options ran dry for him his parents decided to bring him into the family business. If consent for the removals was not offered, Davids mother would forge the signature of a family member. Sensing an opportunity, David Sconce set out to command the market. Im certain that he used his good looks to sort of offset any suspicion about what he was up to., In addition to his effective salesmanship, David Sconce was also ruthless and intimidating. He was described as brash and blunt, difficult to get along with, and sometimes more than a little intimidating. The cost benefit for Coastal Cremations came with the sheer number of bodies Sconce intended to burn: he would keep the fires going all day, planning to burn multiple bodies at once, sometimes five or six at a timea misdemeanor in the state of California. He was a nasty, horrible individual to have any interaction with.. In May 1988, a pile of charred bones, teeth, and prosthetic devices was found in the crawl space beneath David Sconces former rental home in Glendora, where he had lived until early 1987. Laurieannes personal life was less charmed than her professional one. Other funeral homes bear some blame for not being more wary of the low-cost, high-volume operation, according to representatives of the families who were shocked to learn what happened to their deceased relatives. A handwriting expert hired by the Los Angeles County district attorneys office said Laurieanne Sconce had signed the names of survivors on some of the forms permitting organ removal; it is a felony to take organs without permission. Eyes, brains and gold-filled teeth were sold without the knowledge of relatives, while workers competed to see who could stuff the most bodies into the ancient crematory ovens, according to witnesses. Frustrated and bored, he and his friends egged houses and beat up homeless drunks for fun. Laurieanne had given birth to her first child, a son, when she was just a few days shy of her 20th birthday, and it was this son, David, who would go on to both inherit Jerrys charm and take his talent for scheming to an entirely new level. It all began with the Lamb Family Funeral Home, a decades-old business that serviced its clientele from a gracious Spanish Revival building on busy Orange Grove Boulevard in Pasadena, bounded by a strip mall on one side and a residential neighborhood on the other. by Caleb Wilde in Aggregate Death. Although the crematoriums ovens would eventually operate 24 hours a day, David Sconce continued to push the limits of maximum capacity. But he recalled that on the night the business was transferred to him, several people broke into the offices. For more information please contact your local David Funeral Home location or call toll free 1-888-806-6336. It would pass to his two grandsons, who gamely kept it afloat for a year before deciding, as they had years before, that the funeral business was not for them. David Sconce preferring to burn things into oblivion rather than preserve them would turn out to be an odd bit of foreshadowing for both the company and his family legacy. But what really sets this story apart is the thousands of dead bodies involved. Two months later, Waters was dead, presumably of a heart attack. He liked to attend hockey games with a bunch of beefy, ex-football players that he called his boys. Sconces boys testified that they listened to his boasts, ran his errands and roughed up his enemies. Just in case the universe hadnt made it obvious enough what was reallyhappening in that warehouse, when Wentworth opened one of the kilns, a human foot fell out still burning. A former employee testified that Sconce used a flathead screwdriver to pry open jaws to get to the gold fillings, a process he called making the pliers sing and popping chops. Sconce sold this gold to a company called Gold, Gold, Goldhelmed by one of his friendsnetting upwards of $6,000 a month. Homes for rent: Nadezhda Sofia City - 0 listings. Gill said the state investigator in Southern California was suspicious of the Sconce crematory and began trying to find out how the cremations were being done. When the Coen Brothers needed someone to show The Dude how to really roll, they could turn to only one man: Hall of Fame professional bowler Barry Asher. It was designed to be elegant but comfortable, filled with sofas and armchairs. The $15.5 million suit in 1991 involved 20,000 relatives of people cremated at the funeral home. His company, Coastal Cremations Inc., would advertise itself to funeral homes in Los Angeles that didnt have access to a crematorium. Hissentence also carried the caveat of lifetime probation, which he violated often in multiple ways, including selling forged bus tickets in Arizona and attempting to pawn a stolen rifle in Montana (he and his parents were penniless after settling a $15.4 million dollar lawsuit out of court in 1992). Slumber chambers were available for families to rest in, if they so chose. They were burned, and the ashes placed in a barrel together. In the slumber rooms, families were encouraged to make themselves as much at home as though they were in their own residence, according to an old company brochure. They say they do not believe all of the accusations, but they admit that there is too much evidence to deny something went very wrong at the funeral home. He even took the test to become a police officer, but was rejected when a vision test determined he was colorblind. Instead, David quietly installed crematory ovens in a suburb, licensing the facility as a ceramics shop. The Lamb Funeral Home (the funeral home owned by Sconce) case led to a massive lawsuit that also involved 100 mortuaries that contracted with the funeral home for cremations. Furniture salesman Ed Shain, who rented the house after Sconces departure, discovered the remains while replacing the screen on the crawl space and called the authorities, who then spent two days filling two large boxes full of bones, dentures, bridges, bits of skull, pacemaker wires, and a soda can packed with molars. But wait, it somehow gets worse! In 2006, Sconce violated his probation by selling forged bus tickets in Arizona, moving to Montana without permission, and stealing/pawning a neighbors rifle. Another reason: The low, low prices weren't all that was helping Sconce corner the SoCal cremation market. The cost? Prosecutors said the crematory was part. Thats the way it was supposed to be done. In the winter of 2018, the owners saw an opportunity for the second floor of the building. (A brochure described the funeral home as home in every sense of the word.) Lamb had also had the foresight to purchase the Pasadena Crematorium a few years earlier; it was located a few miles away, in the Mountain View Cemetery in Altadena. However, some people do prefer to be cremated. In the aftermath of Sconces capture and conviction, laws were proposed and passed that strengthened the ability of the state to watch over the businesses and inspect the premises. There was jovial Jerry Sconce, 55, the Bible college football coach, his church organist wife, Laurieanne Lamb Sconce, 52, and their son David, 32, a charming ex-football player who had plans to grab a big piece of Californias booming cremation industry. When the editor of a mortuary industry newsletter started asking too many questions about the companys business practices, Sconce sent two of his boys over to the mans house dressed as policemen. Dubbed the Cremation King of California by a journalist, David equipped his new Corvette with vanity plates reading I BRN 4 U.. On November 23, 1986, the crematorium caught fire after two employees tried to break the company record by putting nineteenbodies in each furnace. He was sentenced to five years in prison and released in 1991 after serving two and a half years. Below you, an entire other world operates. California passed new laws (and may have inspired other states to follow suit) that expanded the resources for state inspectors and authorized them to be able to inspect these facilities on demand. We would like to just close it., Do Not Sell or Share My Personal Information, Desperate mountain residents trapped by snow beg for help; We are coming, sheriff says, Hidden, illegal casinos are booming in L.A., with organized crime reaping big profits, Look up: The 32 most spectacular ceilings in Los Angeles, Elliott: Kings use their heads over hearts in trading Jonathan Quick, Newsom, IRS give Californians until October to file tax returns, This fabled orchid breeder loves to chat just not about Trader Joes orchids. Cindy testified she worked for her father, Frank Strunk, at his business, the Cremation Society of California (CSC). Coastal Cremations Inc., of which David Sconce was president, dealt mainly as a wholesaler to other mortuaries, charging only $55 for each cremation, about half what competitors charged. David wasnt too excited about embalming school, but he did see an opportunity to make money in the cremation business. It was purchased by another funeral home, and then sat abandoned for years, and is today a showroom and storage space for a light bulb distributor. Operating under a license for a ceramics factory, David cremated bodies in the facilitys massive brick kilns until the fire chiefs gruesome discovery in January 1987. attempting to pawn a stolen rifle in Montana, in 2013 was sentenced to 25 years to life in prison, an LA-based paranormal investigation group suggested in a blog post, a reader of the paranormal website commented on the blog about Lamb Funeral Home that his or her mother-in-laws body, Keeper Memorials Unveils Obituary Writing Assistant Powered by ChatGPT AI, For Ben Wasserman and his Surprising Audiences, Comedy is a Natural Way to Grieve. What could have been (and should have been) a career-ending calamity was no problem for David Sconce. He had veered towards his father's interests more than his mother's, and had played football. Literally flames and whatnot would be coming out of their chimney, says Jay Brown, whose familys mortuary was next to the Lamb crematory. The Lamb Funeral Home was founded by Lawrence Lamb. (Before Mitford died in 1996, she requested to be cremated, and had the bill for $475 sent to the corporate headquarters of a funeral home chain.). He denounced his industry as the most in-fighting, back-biting, rumor-spreading, lecherous, treacherous people youd ever want to meet in your life. AndCalifornia would rewrite their laws and regulations regarding crematories. As a result of the case, the Legislature passed a bill authorizing inspection of crematories on demand, and it was signed by Gov. Lamb served as president of the state Funeral Directors Assn. Kathy Braidhill, then a crime reporter for the Pasadena Star-News, followed the story of David Sconces crimes, and wrote a 1993 book, Chop Shop, about his cremation scheme. The embalming business boomed. They doubled and redoubled, reaching 8,173 in 1985, as a fleet of vans, station wagons and trucks fanned out, picking up cadavers throughout Southern California. Charged with four felonies, he was extradited to California, and sentenced to 25 years to life. did david sconce the crematorium technician of the. Whilst cremation is definitely becoming more popular after people pass away, funerals still remain the traditional option for many people. Criteria Reorder Criteria. A city of movie magic and Hollywood weirdos, the 33,000-square-mile Greater Los Angeles area was a sprawling film set, where the silhouettes of palm trees lay flat against a gradient wash of wide-angle sunsets. The Lamb Funeral Home in Fontanelle is assisting the family. He had even tried to enlist in the police academy, but failed to get in when the vision test showed him to be colorblind. He entered the plea pursuant to an agreement offered by California Superior Court Judge Terry Smerling. All good? David Sconce originally wanted to follow in his fathers footsteps and become a football player. They had initially faced 67 charges total, including charges relating to the mass cremations, but they escaped most of those counts after throwing David completely under the bus and then throwing thatbus under a bigger bus. Just $4,700 a month, a little more than the average cost of a cremation nowadays. In 1989, defendant and appellant David Wayne Sconce pled guilty to multiple counts relating to the improper handling and disposition of human remains in Los Angeles Superior Court case No. I was at the ovens at Auschwitz, the man said chillingly, Wentworth recalled. Soon, the two ovens at the family crematory in Altadena, the oldest cremation furnaces west of the Mississippi, were running 16 to 18 hours a day. 364 pages,paperback. As the story goes, Nimz opened the door to two large men posing as policemen who sprayed him in the eyes with a mixture of jalapeo juice and ammonia; they hoped to blind him, so they could beat him up without being identified. About Us. May 6, 2013, 3:27 PM. His facility destroyed, David Sconce quietly moved the operation to Hesperia, 20 miles north of San Bernardino in the high desert, where he had installed ovens for what was listed on business permits as a ceramics factory. Homes for sale: Nadezhda Sofia City - 0 listings Show Filters Close Filters Close Map. The Lamb Family Funeral Home still stands on the corner of Orange Grove Boulevard in Pasadena. Wales had received a call from a neighbor, a veteran of World War II, who complained about the smell of the smoke coming out of the factory. As if David Sconces special place in hell wasnt already bought and paid for, he found other sick ways to squeeze every nickel out of the corpses. Death Facts: Part 72. When Hesperia, California assistant fire chief received a call in January 1987 from a man complaining about noxious smoke pouring from a neighboring industrial building, he scoffed at the mans accusation that the smoke smelled like burning flesh. This is probably the worst scandal Ive ever seen, or that I could ever imagine, said John W. Gill, executive officer of Californias Cemetery Board. Laurieannes husband was considered a loser, a cheat, a layabout, and a hustler by her father, Lawrence; though Jerry had been gainfully employed as a football coach for a local Christian college, he quit the job in 1977 to run a sporting goods store, even though he had no previous experience in business. By 1985, Coastal Cremations was burning over 8,000 bodies a year, they only had two furnaces at their location in Altadena, and those ovens were running upwards of 18 hours a day. In a lengthy conversation at County Jail, David conceded that he wrote Lewis will die on the wall of the jail but insisted it was part of a larger message, intended as a joke, that was erased by jail snitches. A double-oven structure built in 1895, it was known among funeral directors as the oldest crematorium west of the Mississippi. Meant to fit one body at a time, Sconce and his associates often filled the retorts with up to 18 bodies. . This Guy Might Be Up To Something). The previous owner, Frank Strunk, who lived on the premises in Los Angeles, drove them off by shouting that he had a gun, he said. Sconce would arrange to pick up a body, transfer it to the Lamb familys crematorium in Altadena, wait the two hours it took to cremate a single bodyone hour to burn, one hour to cool the ovenand bring the ashes back to the funeral home. Reasonable doubt can be a real dick punch sometimes. It is believed that the fire was the result of the bodies being packed in there so tight that it clogged the chimney. The drawing room chapel of his Spanish mission-style building was filled with comfortable sofas and arm chairs. But the war had young men dying far from home, and families of dead Union soldiers begged the army to embalm their sons and send them hundreds of miles north. David Sconce pleaded guilty to 21 charges of conducting mass cremations, mutilating corpses, and the aforementioned assaults-for-hire. Home. Sconce operated the Lamb Funeral Home with his wife, Laurieanne Lamb Sconce. This means you can plan for you, or your loved one, to be cremated at Riemann family funeral homes or others without the concerns that may be raised by reading on. As the Sconces awaited arraignment, the police made another morbid discovery. David Wayne Sconce was a hothead and a creepa golden boy turned failed college football player, with sparkling blue eyes that led some to compare him to Paul Newman. and passed on the business to his son, Lawrence, who became president of the Pasadena school board. While he would be placed on lifetime probation for plotting to kill a rival funeral director, it seemed like small justice for the despair he had caused mourners. In case you were curious, the reader wrote, in a class action suit, the mishandling of your loved ones remains is worth about $1200 a body.. On August 30, 1989, Sconce pled guilty to 21 counts in the Lamb Funeral Home case, which involved charges of mishandling of human remains. But he had been in some trouble, notably when he admitted to police that he had broken into the house of a girlfriends parents when she refused to go out with him anymore. No algorithms. The impact David Sconce left on the funeral business is still being felt today. Edwards testified that Sconce told him he had dropped something into Waters drink at a restaurant--authorities later decided it was in Simi Valley--a month before the Burbank mortician died. Under the state Health and Safety Code, it is a misdemeanor to cremate more than one body at a time. But he was denied entrance to the Altadena facility because he did not have a search warrant. On so many levels, David Sconces story is one that deathcare professionals dont like to hear. That morning, employee John Hallinan said, he and another worker loaded 38 bodies into the two furnaces, each measuring 3.5 feet high by 4 feet wide by 8 feet long. His great-grandfather, Lawrence Lamb, purchased the Pasadena Crematorium in Altadena, California a few years before starting Lamb Funeral Home in 1929 just two miles away. The ashes are then removed and strained to remove large pieces of bone, medical pins, etc. In 1974, as a freshman planning to major in business, he robbed a former girlfriends house twicethe second time on Christmas Eve, while she was at church with her familyas revenge for breaking up with him. He told his parents that he wanted to start his own cremation company, working as an affiliate to the family funeral home. Its important to go with the best option for you. Sconce himself served 5 years before being released. Honestly, if it werent for one Holocaust survivors sense memory and a call to the Air Quality Control hotline, theres no telling how much longer and further David Sconce wouldve taken this scam. His wife and children helped in the business of burials, and over the years and decades that would follow from taking in that first corpse Charles became a big name in California funerals. Laurieanne was a bright, cheerful, God-fearing woman once described as movie-star beautiful by a rival mortician, and who played the church organ and wrote gospel songs with her choral group, the Chapelbelles. The LA smog also concealed the smoke that mortician David Sconce pumped from a makeshift crematoriumtwo ceramic kilns housed in a corrugated metal warehouseway out in San Bernardino County. He decorated the interior with couches, chairs, and various other accoutrements to make mourners feel comfortable. I was at the ovens at Auschwitz! Wentworth, Wales, and investigators from Californias Cemetery and Funeral Boards drove over to Oscar Ceramics to investigate. David's mother Laurieanne Lamb Sconce and her husband Jerry bought out the family business from her father in 1985. It all began with the Lamb Family Funeral Home. Sconce, who worked at the funeral home, is serving a five-year state prison term after pleading guilty in April 1989 to 21 criminal counts involving the mingling of human remains, the theft.