Potato-chip can sits where woman's ashes were

Synagogue sued over missing ashes
Potato-chip can found in place of woman's remains in mausoleum
By ROMA KHANNA
Copyright 2005 Houston Chronicle


Carlos Antonio Rios/Chronicle
When relatives of Vivian Shulman Lieberman went to visit her final resting place in a Houston mausoleum one year ago today, they discovered that the cedar chest containing her ashes was missing.

In its place, behind the locked, glass door of Lieberman's niche in Congregation Beth Israel's mausoleum, was a can of sour-cream-and-onion potato chips.

The ashes are still missing, says Philip Hilder, an attorney for Lieberman's two daughters.

"We have been devastated," Marcelle Lieberman said this week. "We hope we will be able to find her remains before we die, to give us closure of some sort."

The strange disappearance led Marcelle Lieberman and her sister, Harriet Lieberman Mellow, to file a lawsuit recently against Congregation Beth Israel and two funeral businesses.

Officials with the synagogue and the two companies deny responsibility.

"It is obviously very upsetting to the family and to all three of the defendants," said Neal Manne, a lawyer and Beth Israel board member who is representing the synagogue. "But a lawsuit is about whether there is any legal responsibility, and Congregation Beth Israel did not do anything wrong."

Though it is not unheard of for bodies to be mixed up before cremation or even buried in the wrong graves, officials with national cemetery groups say such a disappearance is extremely rare once ashes have been placed in a mausoleum.

"This is a first for me," said Robert Fells of the Virginia-based International Cemetery and Funeral Association.

In addition to suing Beth Israel, which owns and operates the cemetery on West Dallas just west of downtown, the sisters are suing the companies that arranged for their mother's cremation and inurnment, Levy Funeral Directors and Schlitzberger's Family Craft Monumental Services. The lawsuit seeks unspecified damages and alleges that each defendant was negligent and intentionally inflicted emotional distress.

Beth Israel, one of Houston's largest Reform congregations, played a major role in the Liebermans' lives, the lawsuit states. Vivian and Seymour Lieberman bought side-by-side mausoleum niches in 1964.

The Liebermans were active in the community, with Vivian working as a Texas Children's Hospital volunteer and Seymour being honored with an exercise trail named for him in Memorial Park.

He died in February 1981 and his ashes were placed in the mausoleum. His wife died July 2, 2003, at age 95.

In their lawsuit, the daughters say they arranged for her cremation through Levy Funeral Directors and gave its director, Stan Ford, a cedar chest in which to put the ashes. Ford locked the chest and gave it to Schlitzberger's, which was to make a brass nameplate for the chest, the daughters contend.

But when a Schlitzberger's employee took the ashes to the mausoleum in July 2003, he discovered another person's remains in Lieberman's niche, according to the lawsuit.

About two weeks later, after the congregation's executive director learned of that problem, a Schlitzberger's employee placed her ashes in the niche, court documents state.

Marcelle Lieberman says she visited the niche that July and her sister visited in fall 2003.

The daughters say they returned to the mausoleum together on June 10, 2004, their father's birthday, and discovered the potato chip can in their mother's niche.

A locksmith opened the niche and Houston police took custody of the can, which still contained potato chips.

"To their added horror," the lawsuit states, "Harriet and Marcelle learned that the ... can had been visible in the niche for at least six months."

The daughters allege that Schlitzberger's failed to close and lock the niche.

Company co-owner Dianne Schlitzberger says none of her employees ever had a key.

"Putting the name tag on the box is a little thing," she said. "We wouldn't ruin our reputation by losing something so valuable."

She noted that the mausoleum itself is never locked.

Manne said that although the congregation owns and operates the cemetery, families get keys to the niches they purchase.

"They can do with them as they wish," he said. "Some choose to leave them in the lock at the niche and some don't."

The lawsuit also alleges that Congregation Beth Israel breached its contract by "placing the remains of another person in the niche" and "by failing to provide adequate care, maintenance or security for the mausoleum."

"It is unknown at this time whether this was an individual episode," Hilder said, "or if that is a snapshot to wider problems."

Manne maintains that the synagogue fulfilled its duties.

"In court, we will be able to demonstrate what happened and that it was not related to anything Beth Israel did," he said.

The lawsuit also claims that Levy Funeral Directors failed to ensure that Vivian Lieberman's ashes were in a secure place.

Greg Bolton, a spokesman for Service Corporation International, the parent company of Levy, says the funeral home upheld its responsibilities.

"We fulfilled the family's wishes by arranging for the cremation and delivering the remains to the custody of the mausoleum," he said. "We had no involvement or knowledge of anything that happened after that."