Daniel Borunda

El Paso Times

Funeral home, mortuary business owners accused of using forged documents to transport bodies.

Detectives allegedly found decomposing bodies that should have been cremated at funeral home.

An El Paso funeral home has been ordered to pay more than $290,000 in restitution to customers whose prepaid funeral contracts were canceled without permission and they never received a refund.

The Texas Department of Banking earlier this month ordered El Paso Mission Funeral Home to pay restitution, as well as $127,000 in penalties in the wake of an investigation by the El Paso County Sheriff's Office, the state agency said.

In September 2014, sheriff's detectives arrested funeral home owner, Lina Lucia Ruedas, 80, her son Antonio Ruedas, 47, and Joseph A. Solis, 55, owner of Mortuary Services Inc. for allegedly using forged documents to transport and store bodies.

The three face charges of forgery, tampering with government records and abuse of a corpse following an investigation that found five decomposing bodies in the Central El Paso funeral home.

In September 2015, the Texas Department of Banking ordered the El Paso Mission Funeral Home to seize and desist activity related to the trust-funded prepaid funerals after it found that numerous contracts had been fraudulently canceled, the agency said.

The investigation reveled that the funeral home, at 2600 E. Yandell Dr., canceled 127 customer contracts without permission and that the customers never received a refund, according to court records in Austin.

The banking department will administer the restitution payments, officials said in a news release.

El Paso Mission Funeral Home fraudulently withdrew nearly $87,000 in principal and more than $203,000 in interest from the trust fund from about January 2011 to May 2014, according to court records.

The document listed the operators of the business as Lina Ruedas as the funeral home's owner, president and secretary; vice-president Francisco X. Ruedas and Antonio A. Ruedas Jr., as funeral director.

Jail records also list Antonio Ruedas as Antonio A. Ruedas Jr.

A funeral director on Monday said that the funeral home had no comment regarding the restitution order.

The document from the Texas Department of Banking mentioned that the restitution agreement is not an admission of liability or a violation of the law by the funeral home.

In 2014, Lina Ruedas, Antonio Ruedas and Solis were arrested by sheriff's detectives on suspicion of forgery, tampering with documents and corpse abuse after investigators found five bodies that were supposed to have been cremated at the funeral home.

The bodies, including a fetus, were in various stages of decomposition, some with mold and visible bones, sheriff's officials had said. The funeral home was allegedly transporting bodies to Juárez using tampered documents.

Sheriff's officials had said that an investigation into Solis began in August 2014 after El Paso County Clerk Delia Briones reported receiving a government document — a burial transit permit — from a Portland, Ore., mortuary service with her unauthorized signature.

Solis allegedly used the permit to transport a body out of state, investigators said.

The Texas Funeral Service Commission had suspended Mortuary Services' license in March 2014 after the commission received a complaint that Solis was allegedly forging the name and license number of a Houston funeral director to transport bodies in Texas and out of state without legal authority, according to a criminal complaint filed by sheriff's detectives.

The affidavit stated Solis had a business contract to provide mortuary services for some El Paso hospitals.

Investigators alleged that Solis had no authority to take possession of the bodies and that about 35 death certificates were created and filed by his company since his license was suspended. Solis allegedly stored bodies at El Paso Mission Funeral Home.

Solis, who faces 42 counts of tampering with government records and 37 counts of forgery of government records, remains at the El Paso County Jail Annex under a $135,500 bond.

Lina Ruedas faces five counts each of forgery, tampering with a government document and abuse of a corpse. Antonio Ruedas faces one count of forgery, one count of tampering with a government record and three counts of abuse of a corpse.

Lina and Antonio Ruedas are free on bond. All three cases are pending in court.

El Paso Mission Funeral Home's license is listed as "delinquent" with an expiration date of April 30, 2016, according to state records.

Customers who have bought trust-funded prepaid funeral contracts from El Paso Mission Funeral Home and believe they've been the victims of fraud should contact the Department of Banking at 877-276-5554.

Daniel Borunda may be reached at 546-6102; dborunda@elpasotimes.com; @BorundaDaniel on Twitter. Senior Editor Cindy Ramirez contributed to this report.