Families sue funeral homes for mixing up cremated remains
J.B. Ratterman & Sons Funerals & Family Cremation Care in Louisville, Ky. (Google Maps).
Two Kentucky families are suing local funeral home owners for allegedly mixing up and possibly losing the cremated remains of their loved ones.
Bobby Hinkel lost his mother Charlotte Hinkel back in December 2023, but after their family received her cremains from J.B. Ratterman & Sons Funerals & Family Cremation Care in Louisville, Kentucky, the family had a bad feeling about the box they’d been handed. They called Louisville NBC affiliate WAVE for help looking into the case.
WAVE reported that the chain of custody documents kept by J.B. Ratterman indicated that the body of Charlotte Hinkel had been taken to the Ratterman funeral home before being cremated at a different funeral home. That business, Cloverport Funeral Home, was not registered or licensed to do cremations, according to an investigation by the Kentucky Attorney General’s office, which fined the funeral home $580,000.
The AG’s investigation found that a total of 290 illegal cremations, including Charlotte Hinkel, took place at Cloverport Funeral Home.
But now Bobby Hinkel has doubts that the cremains he received belong to his late mother. “I don’t know if that’s my mom, I don’t know if it’s somebody else’s,” Bobby told WAVE. “And we’ll probably never know.”
Rebecca Moore was another customer who used J.B. Ratterman’s funeral and cremation services after the death of her uncle Ira Ison. After his body made its way to J.B. Ratterman’s, the owner — Tony Ratterman — reported his cremains missing. Ison’s family did receive what they were told were his cremains. A chemical test reportedly proved that what they really received was soil.
A representative of J.B. Ratterman reportedly said in an affidavit that while their business offered cremation services, they did not have the facilities on-site to perform cremations. They entered into a partnership with Anthony Oxendine, the owner of Cloverport Funeral Home, to do the cremations.
Oxendine, however, has a checkered past of his own, according to WAVE. A failed mayoral candidate in Louisville, Oxendine’s career as a funeral professional began in Indiana. He was reportedly denied a funeral director license back in 2016 as well as a funeral director courtesy card in 2017. He eventually owned and managed Spring Valley Funeral Home in Indiana and later transferred his ownership to an unidentified person, WAVE reported. An investigation into that business reportedly revealed unsanitary conditions and dozens of unclaimed cremains. Spring Valley Funeral Home is now permanently closed.
According to WAVE, while Ratterman attended the Kentucky Board of Funeral Home Directors and Embalmers in January 2024, he reportedly brought up issues he was having with Oxendine about funerals that he conducted during December 2023 — the same time frame as the funerals for Charlotte Hinkel and Ira Ison.
WAVE reported that while Oxendine is also being sued alongside Tony Ratterman, owner of J.B. Ratterman & Sons, he had not yet been served with the lawsuit. Ratterman responded to the lawsuit by issuing a denial of all the accusations.
Tony Ratterman reportedly told WAVE that he still wanted to tell his side of the story but would not comment on the lawsuit.
