WAYNE COUNTY, Mich. – A Wayne County family watched their loved one die from lung disease.
They hired an autopsy company for answers, but they said they never got any answers. They filed a civil suit in Wayne County District Court.
Richard Wahl died of lung disease last year. He left behind a wife and three adult children. For decades he worked in a factory, potentially being exposed to asbestos.
The Brownstone family hired Shawn Parcells’ autopsy company to determine if Wahl had died of mesothelioma.
“If they could link asbestos lung disease to the cause of death they would have been entitled to apply to a fund that might help them,” the family’s attorney Samuel H. Pietsch said.
The family paid the company $3,500 but Wahl was cremated and there were no records of an autopsy.
“It turns out that Parcells not only took their money, but that of over 300 other people in various forms of this same scam,” Pietsch said.
The owner of the autopsy company is facing federal charges. A federal indictment out of Kansas alleges that Parcells’ business, National Autopsy Company, took payments from 375 clients -- worth $1.1 million.
“The fact that he may end up in prison, or facing a substantial fine isn’t going to be much consolation to my clients -- or people like them. But at least it will stop him from doing this again,” Pietsch said.
The federal indictment alleges that in some cases the company made it appear as though reports were from a pathologist when there wasn’t one. In others, they submitted a cause of death when the defendant lacked the knowledge, training and authority.
If convicted, Parcells could face up to 20 years in prison.