Pompano Beach Funeral Home Negligence Lawyer
Pompano Beach sits a few minutes up Federal Highway from our Fort Lauderdale office, and its funeral cases are filed in the same courthouse we are in most weeks. We take these claims for families across Broward County: wrongful cremation, remains lost or released to the wrong people, failed embalming, burial in the wrong plot. We serve Pompano Beach from our Fort Lauderdale office, and a suit like this is filed in the Seventeenth Judicial Circuit at the Broward County Courthouse. Call 954-522-5800 and speak to a lawyer about what happened.
Do not give a recorded statement to the funeral home or its insurer before you speak to a lawyer. Write down every business you dealt with by name, the funeral home, the crematory and the cemetery. In Broward those are frequently three separate companies, and each holds a different piece of what happened.
The closest market to our main office
Below is what a Pompano Beach funeral home claim involves: what goes wrong locally, what Florida requires you to prove, how that gets proved, and what it is worth. The statutes sit on the statewide page. This is the local part.
Pompano Beach funeral home claims are filed in the Seventeenth Judicial Circuit at the Broward County Courthouse. Direct cremation is common here and a large share of families live out of state, which together account for most local authorization failures. Florida allows these claims with no physical injury.
What to do this week
None of this requires a lawyer and all of it is easier now than in six months. Where a case exists, these are also the steps that decide how strong it is.
- Keep the paperwork you already have. The contract, the price list, the authorization forms, the death certificate, the cremation authorization if there was one, the receipts, the correspondence and anything from a cemetery or a crematory. Photograph all of it today. These files are usually thin and the originals are usually held by the funeral home, so what the family kept is frequently the only independent copy of anything.
- Write down the sequence while it is fresh. Who you spoke to and when, what you were told each time, what changed between one conversation and the next, and who else was in the room. The inconsistency between what a funeral home said on Tuesday and what it said on Friday is regularly the strongest evidence in these files, and it exists only if somebody wrote both down at the time.
- Ask for the remains to be left alone. Where anything can still be examined, say in writing that nothing further should be done: no further preparation, no cremation, no burial, no transfer, until it has been looked at. It is an uncomfortable thing to ask for and it is frequently the difference between proving a case and describing one. Say it to the funeral home and, where a regulator or a medical examiner is involved, say it to them as well.
How these cases arise in Pompano Beach
Pompano Beach is barely fifteen minutes from 2101 W Commercial Blvd, which matters more in these cases than in most. Funeral home claims turn on records that get overwritten, discarded or simply lost, and being able to put someone in front of a funeral director or a cemetery office the same week is a practical advantage rather than a marketing line.
The city runs from the beach across to the west side along Atlantic Boulevard, and the funeral homes and cemeteries serving it also serve Lighthouse Point, Deerfield Beach and unincorporated Broward. A family will often find the establishment they dealt with is not in the city they live in, which changes nothing about the claim but does change which records exist and who holds them.
North Broward’s funeral work runs heavily on low-cost direct cremation, and speed is the thing that produces these cases.
Direct cremation, arranged online
A transaction completed without anybody meeting anybody, at a price that depends on volume.
- Identification steps compressed between collection and cremation
- Authorization taken electronically from whoever was reachable
- A cremation completed before an objection could reach anybody
- Nothing recoverable and nothing correctable afterward
Ashes returned, and what was in the container
A large part of what goes wrong here is discovered weeks after the family took delivery.
- Remains lost between the crematory and the family
- Ashes that were not the right person’s, or were mixed with another
- A container handed over sealed and not opened until far too late to ask
- Crematory logs and identification tags, which either support the account or do not
Older residents living alone
A high proportion of deaths at home, which means the county was involved first.
- District 17 release records fixing when custody transferred
- Identification carried out before the establishment was involved
- An independent written record that predates the funeral home’s own
- Among the first things requested in a Pompano file
High-volume shared facilities
The establishment the family dealt with is regularly not where the body was held.
- Bodies held together at a facility serving several businesses
- Release paperwork at each handover between them
- Identification at collection, at transfer and at the retort
- Complaint and licensing history for every business in the chain
What we ask Pompano Beach families to look at
- A funeral home in one Broward city and a cemetery in another, each pointing at the other
- Cremation authorization signed by a relative who was not the legal next of kin
- A burial plot deed that does not match the section and row the cemetery shows
- Personal effects, jewelry or clothing that never came back to the family
What actually goes wrong
These are the failures that bring families to this firm. Where a death fell under the Broward County Medical Examiner, the release paperwork usually shows who held custody at the moment one of them happened, and it is among the first records we request.
- Visible deterioration at an open casket viewing the family was assured would be possible
- Organs, tissue or a prosthesis removed, retained or discarded without anybody asking
- A body shipped to the wrong destination, or held for weeks while paperwork nobody explained was chased
- Jewelry, clothing and personal effects that went in and did not come back
- A preneed contract sold years earlier and then not honored, with the family told the terms were different
- A death certificate completed wrongly, delaying everything that depends on it
What a family is left with
A funeral that has to be done twice
Where remains are recovered, or a burial is corrected, the family goes through it again: another day, another set of arrangements, another gathering of the same people, and this time with everybody knowing why. The costs of that are recoverable and they are the smallest part of it.
The part where nobody believed them
Almost every family in these cases spent weeks being told they were mistaken, or upset, or misremembering, before anybody admitted anything. That period is its own harm and it is worth documenting, because it also goes to how the establishment behaved once it knew.
Physical and psychological illness
Sleep that does not return, weight lost, work missed, existing conditions that worsen, and treatment that would not otherwise have been needed. Where somebody has seen a doctor or a counselor about it, those records matter and they are part of the claim rather than a private matter kept out of it.
What Florida law requires you to prove
The claim exists without any physical injury
Florida is unusual here, and it is the single thing most families are told wrongly. The ordinary rule is that mental anguish is not recoverable without an accompanying physical injury. The mishandling of a dead body is a recognized exception to that rule, so a family with no physical injury at all still has a claim.
The statewide page sets out the authority for that, along with the standard of proof Florida applies, which is higher than most families are told and is worth understanding before anybody decides what to do.
Who was entitled to decide, and in what order
Florida decides by statute who may authorize a burial or a cremation, in a fixed order of priority, and a cremation cannot happen at all without that person’s written authorization. A very large share of these cases begins with somebody who was not on that list signing a form, or with nobody signing one. That order, and what it means for who may bring a claim, is set out in full on the statewide page.
The establishment, the licensee and the people who work there
Florida licenses funeral establishments, direct disposal establishments, cremation facilities, cemeteries and the individuals working in them, and a licensee is answerable for what happens under its license. The claim usually runs against more than one of them, and where a body passed between a funeral home, a crematory and a cemetery, the question of who held custody at the moment something went wrong is answered from the release paperwork rather than from anybody’s account.
The deadline
Most claims arising on or after March 24, 2023 have to be filed within two years, and an older one keeps the four years that applied when it happened. The practical deadline is much shorter, because the records that decide these cases sit with the establishment and the physical evidence is regularly destroyed as part of the very thing being complained about.
How we prove it in Broward County
Where a cremation has already happened, the case is proved on records rather than on anything physical, which makes getting to them quickly the whole game.
- The contract and every authorization form, checked against Florida’s order of priority
- Crematory logs, identification tags and the release record for each handover
- Medical examiner release documentation where District 17 held the body
- The electronic trail where authorization was taken online, including timestamps
- Identification and transfer logs at the facility that did the work
- Every communication with the establishment, in date order
- Licensing and complaint history for each business involved
- Treatment records for anybody in the family who sought help afterward
Where authorization was taken online, the timestamps are the case. Ask for the full electronic record early, because it shows exactly when the establishment had authority and exactly when it acted, and those two are frequently in the wrong order.
What the funeral home and its insurer will say
The response in these files follows a pattern, and it starts with sympathy and a refund. What follows is worth recognizing for what it is.
It was an administrative error and it has been corrected
Corrected how, by whom, and recorded where. An establishment that says a mistake has been fixed has created a document saying so, and that document is requested. Where the mistake was a cremation, nothing has been corrected, and describing it that way is itself worth noting.
You have no proof this happened
Said early, and usually while the establishment holds all of the records. The contract, the authorizations, the release paperwork, the logs, the transfer records and the internal correspondence exist and are obtained. Where a regulator has investigated, that file exists too. The family being unable to prove it in the first week is not the same as it being unprovable.
The person who signed authorized exactly this
Then produce the authorization, and let it be compared against who Florida says was entitled to give it and what it actually says. These forms are frequently signed by the wrong relative, signed after the fact, signed in blank, or not signed at all. It is one of the most productive things to examine in the whole file.
What a claim can include
- Income lost while dealing with it. Time away from work during the discovery, the correction and the treatment, which in these cases runs for months rather than days.
- Punitive damages where the conduct warrants it. Available in Florida on a heightened standard and on a court’s permission rather than as of right. Concealment, forged paperwork and a pattern of earlier complaints are what move a case into that territory.
- Mental anguish, which is the case. Not an add-on here. The emotional harm to the family is the injury Florida recognizes in these claims, and it is the largest part of what one is worth.
Why this office for a Pompano Beach case
A Pompano Beach funeral home claim is filed in the Seventeenth Judicial Circuit at the Broward County Courthouse, and we serve Pompano Beach from the firm’s Fort Lauderdale office on West Commercial Boulevard. We do not claim an office in Pompano and would rather say so than imply one. The case is filed in the same courthouse either way.
Who you would be dealing with
A Pompano Beach funeral home case is handled by one of the four trial attorneys in this photograph. You will speak with the attorney who has your case, and you will have their direct line whenever you need them.
They have been trying Broward County cases together since 1993, and a suit arising in Pompano Beach is filed in the Seventeenth Judicial Circuit at the Broward County Courthouse.
Meet the attorneys →Pompano Beach funeral home questions
Answered by Brett J. Yonon, who handles the firm's funeral home and wrongful death cases.
The funeral home is in Pompano but the cemetery is somewhere else in Broward. Who is responsible?
Possibly both, and that is a normal shape for these cases. The funeral home and the cemetery are usually separate businesses under separate licenses, each with its own records and its own duties. We ask both for their files rather than accepting either one’s account of what the other did.
Everything was arranged through a website and we never met anybody.
That usually helps rather than hurts, because an online arrangement leaves timestamps. When the authorization was submitted, by whom, from what address, and when the cremation was actually carried out are all recorded. In several of these cases the record shows the establishment acted before it had authority, and that is not something anybody can argue about afterward.
We were given ashes and we are not sure they are the right ones.
Do not scatter or inter them, and say in writing to the establishment today that everything is to be preserved. Crematories keep logs, identification tags and release records, and those records either support what you were told or they do not. It is a question with a documented answer, and the documents stop being available with time.
Where would a Pompano Beach funeral home case actually be filed?
In the Seventeenth Judicial Circuit at the Broward County Courthouse. Which courthouse matters more than people expect, because local practice, the judges and the jury pool all differ by circuit. We try these cases in Broward County rather than referring them out.
Do you have an office in Pompano Beach?
No, and we would rather say so than imply otherwise. We serve Pompano Beach from our Fort Lauderdale office at 2101 W Commercial Blvd, Suite 1500, Fort Lauderdale, FL 33309, which is where your case would be handled and where the lawyer working it sits. Nothing about that changes the claim: it is filed in the Seventeenth Judicial Circuit at the Broward County Courthouse either way, and the first conversation costs you nothing wherever you are.
More in Pompano Beach
Fort Lauderdale Personal Injury Lawyer
The office that covers Pompano Beach, and everything else we handle from it.
View →Florida Funeral Home Negligence Lawyer
The Florida standard of proof, the regulator, and the warning signs.
View →Case Results
Verdicts and settlements, including a $3,500,000 funeral home jury verdict.
View →
Nobody at the funeral home will give you a straight answer
Tell a lawyer what happened. We serve Pompano Beach from our Fort Lauderdale office at 2101 W Commercial Blvd, Suite 1500, Fort Lauderdale, FL 33309, and the conversation costs nothing even if we tell you there is no case to bring.