Page 7 - IAV Digital Magazine #617

iAV - Antelope Valley Digital Magazine
Funeral Home Director Gave Fake Ashes
To Thousands of Grieving Pet Owners,
Dumped Actual Carcasses In Landfill
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W9kC62An9KE
By David Harris
A Pennsylvania funeral home director allegedly bilked some 6,500 people out of more than $650,000 by promising to cremate their cats and dogs, but instead dumping the ani- mal carcasses in a landfill and giving the pet owners fake ashes.
Patrick Vereb, 70, is charged with several felony counts, including theft by deception, receiving stolen property and deceptive business practices, Attorney General Dave Sunday announced. Vereb, the owner of Vereb Funeral Home and Eternity Pet Memorial in
the Pittsburgh area, told pet owners he would cre- mate their dog or cat and
return the ashes in an urn for a fee. But instead of actually cremating the ani- mals, he would dump the carcasses in a landfill and give the ashes of an unknown animal to the cus- tomers, Sunday said.
“From 2021 and 2024, Mr. Vereb neglected his duty of care by deliberately and repeatedly betraying his customers who wanted a dignified service for their beloved dog or cat,” Sunday said in a prere- corded video.
Sunday noted that the cus- tomers paid Vereb a “sig- nificant amount of money” for those services. The case is so extensive that the AG’s office created a website and email address
to update victims on the status of their cases.
“As a pet owner myself, I can’t imagine the heart- break in learning that you were affected by a crime like this,” Sunday stated, adding that he found the case “disturbing.”
According to local CBS affiliate KDKA, the case broke open thanks to an intern-turned-whistleblower. Tiffany Mantzouridis earned an internship at the funeral home after graduat- ing from mortuary school in February 2024. In addition to helping with human funerals, she told the TV station Verb also had her handle the cremations for the dogs and cats.
“He would get pets in, and they wouldn’t go in the freezers,” she said, adding that it is important to freeze the carcasses to preserve them.
She also said the spread- sheet that kept track of the cremations was inaccurate.
“And then when I pulled the spreadsheet up, I noticed that there was a very alarming amount of pets that didn’t have cre- matory numbers,” she said.
Mantzouridis concluded, “There was something very bad going on.” She claimed Vereb would send the big- ger pets to the crematory but not the smaller ones. He would then allegedly mix the ashes all together and give them to the own- ers as if it were only their pet.
Vereb was taken into cus- tody Monday and released on his own recognizance. His next court date is scheduled for May 9.
According to the funeral home’s website, Vereb became a licensed funeral director at the age of 21. He boasts “there are over 20,000 pet’s portraits”
on PetMemorialPittsburgh. com.
iAV - Antelope Valley Digital Magazine