Funeral director 'left baby's remains on floor for two years'

This story contains details some might find distressing.

The remains of a stillborn baby were left on the floor of a funeral home for almost two years and his grieving parents given the wrong ashes, a court has heard.

Former undertaker Robert Bush admitted 67 offences, including failing to bury and cremate people at Legacy Independent Funeral Directors in Hull.

Jasmine Beverley told Hull Crown Court that learning her baby Sunny-Beverley Conlin was discovered in a brown paper bag on the floor of the Hessle Road parlour in March 2024 "will stay with me for the rest of my life".

Addressing Bush through tears, she told him: "I trusted you with the most precious person in my life."

Some 35 bodies and more than 100 sets of ashes were found at the business run by Bush.

The court heard he falsely told families they had been cremated or buried and gave them the ashes of strangers.

Beverley was one of several victims who read out statements on the second day of the five-day sentencing hearing.

Sunny's remains were recovered from the funeral parlour a year and 10 months after he was stillborn on 13 May 2022, the court heard.

Mr Justice Hilliard was told the parents thought they had collected their son's ashes from Bush the following March, when he handed them a tiny blue coffin containing an envelope.

Sobbing in court, Beverley told Bush: "Your actions have taken away something that can never be replaced - the peace of believing our loved ones were treated with care and respect after death.

"The reality I now live with is that my baby boy Sunny has spent more time in your possession than he ever did with his own family."

The court also heard from Lucy Ness, who was given an urn containing "wadding and pieces of bone" instead of her baby's ashes.

"I put my trust in Robert to do the right thing and look after my baby. He has done the lowest of the low," she said.

"I have now been left with nothing but an empty bag, which once contained the ashes of my baby.

"I will never know what he has done to them, where they have gone or who they are with.

"That baby was my hope and I can never forgive him for what he has done. I will never recover."

Stacey Foster and her partner Peter Cooke had jewellery made from the ashes of their son Tommy, who they lost at just over 17 weeks in August 2023, the prosecution said.

However, the couple later learned Bush gave them the wrong remains.

Foster told the court: "The heartache that we have gone through is immense."

Earlier on Tuesday, the court heard from the family of 73-year-old Terence White, whose body was recovered from Legacy more than two months after his death on Christmas Eve 2023.

In a victim impact statement, his daughter Angela Scottow said Bush arranged her father's cremation but later found there was no record of one having taken place.

"Dad was such a lovely man and Robert Bush treated him like a piece of meat," she said.

She later said: "He knew exactly what he was doing. He stripped all dignity from our loved ones, and for what? Money? He disgusts me."

The court also heard how the family of Jim Porter, 80, whose body was recovered from Legacy with his hospital identification bands still on his wrists and ankle, had noted his coffin did not look big enough for him.

In her statement, his daughter Tina Thames said: "I was devastated. I had nightmares and thoughts of bodies, just piled up came into my mind.

"The only way I can describe it is like seeing images of the bodies found in Auschwitz during [World War Two]."

Kadie Laws, whose father Darren Laws' ashes were recovered from Legacy, sobbed while reading her statement.

She recalled shouting "it better not be my dad in there" when she first heard about the police investigation.

Laws, who suffers from PTSD, depression and anxiety following the loss of her father, said she felt "extreme anger" towards Bush.

"My family and I are never going to heal from this trauma. I'll never be myself again and that's because of Robert Bush."

Kerry Webb also became emotional as she told the court how her mother, Julie Webb, was one of the bodies found by police.

Instead of being cremated, her mother had been left in the parlour and it took police seven weeks to identify her, she said.

"How could someone be so cruel? Seven weeks of heartbreak, of not knowing if it was truly my mum inside that coffin, of not knowing what had happened to her body, of being terrified that somebody had hurt her."

Bush's fraudulent activity was laid out to the court, detailing how he gave 46 families the wrong ashes and 11 were given nothing at all.

Prosecutor Chris Paxton KC said the total monetary value of the fraud was £86,868 and that Bush had conned 226 people who paid him for funeral plans, pocketing more than £550,000 over an 11-year period.

Among the victims was Shelley Chearman, who lost her husband Alan.

She told Bush: "You fooled a lot of people in Hull with your mild manner, when in fact you are a cruel conman. You use people's grief to fund your lifestyle."

Outlining the case on Monday, Paxton told the court bodies had been discovered "on the racks" of a cold storage area and one was found on a stretcher on the floor.

The vast majority were "uncovered and in varying states of decomposition" and the funeral home was "dirty and unkempt".

The 48-year-old's crimes were discovered by chance while he was on holiday, after two funeral directors tipped off police.

Bush, of Otley, West Yorkshire, was arrested when he landed at Heathrow Airport days later and told police he had debts of about £90,000, Paxton said.

The hearing continues.

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