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."
Jun 6, 2005
LIKE A FISH
An Israeli Inventor has developed a breathing apparatus that will allow breathing underwater without the assistance of oxygen tanks. This new invention will use the relatively small amounts of air that already exist in water to supply oxygen to both scuba divers and submarines. The invention has already captured the interest of most major diving manufacturers as well as the Israeli Navy.
The idea of breathing underwater without cumbersome oxygen tanks has been the dream of science fiction writers for many years. In George Lucas� movie 'The Phantom Menace', Obi-Wan whips out a little Jedi underwater breathing apparatus and dives in. As things tend to happen in our world, yesterday's science fiction has turned into today's science fact due to one Israeli inventor with a dream.
There are a number of limitations to the existing oxygen tank underwater breathing method. The first is the amount of time a diver can stay underwater, which is the result of the oxygen tank capacity. Another limitation is the dependence on oxygen refueling facilities near the diving site which are costly to operate and are used to compress the gas into the tanks which might be dangerous if not handled properly. The final problem has to do with the actual use of oxygen tanks underwater. When these tanks are in use they empty out and change the balance of the diver in the water.
Engineers have tried to overcome these limitations for many years now. Nuclear submarines and the international space station use systems that generate Oxygen from water by performing 'Electrolysis', which is chemical separation of Oxygen from Hydrogen.
These systems require very large amounts of energy to operate. For this reason, smaller, diesel fueled submarines cannot use these systems and are required to resurface to re-supply their oxygen tanks every so often. Divers can't even consider carrying such large machines not to mention supplying them with energy. To overcome this limitation an Israeli inventor, Alon Bodner, turned to fish.
Fish do not perform chemical separation of oxygen from water; instead they use the dissolved air that exists in the water in order to breathe. In the ocean the wind, waves and underwater currents help spread small amounts of air inside the water. Studies have shown that in a depth of 200m below the sea there is still about 1.5% of dissolved air. This might not sound like much but it is enough to allow both small and large fish to breathe comfortably underwater. Bodner’s idea was to create an artificial system that will mimic the way fish use the air in the water thus allowing both smaller submarines and divers to get rid of the large, cumbersome oxygen tanks.
The general structure of the system
The system developed by Bodner uses a well known physical law called the "Henry Law" which describes gas absorption in liquids. This law states that the amount of gas that can be dissolved in a liquid body is proportional to the pressure on the liquid body. The law works in both directions – lowering the pressure will release more gas out of the liquid. This is done by a centrifuge which rotates rapidly thus creating under pressure inside a small sealed chamber containing sea water. The system will be powered by rechargeable batteries. Calculations showed that a one kilo Lithium battery can provide a diver with about one hour of diving time.
Alon Bodner
Bodner has already built and tested a laboratory model and he is on the path to building a full-scale prototype. Patents for the invention have already been granted in Europe and a similar one is currently pending examination in the U.S. Meetings have already been held with most major diving manufacturers as well as with the Israeli Navy. Initial financial support for the project has been given by Israel Ministry of Industry and Commerce and Bodner is currently looking for private investors to help complete his project.
If everything goes according to plan, in a few years the new tankless breathing system will be operational and will be attached to a diver in the form of a vest that will enable him to stay underwater for a period of many hours.
The idea of breathing underwater without cumbersome oxygen tanks has been the dream of science fiction writers for many years. In George Lucas� movie 'The Phantom Menace', Obi-Wan whips out a little Jedi underwater breathing apparatus and dives in. As things tend to happen in our world, yesterday's science fiction has turned into today's science fact due to one Israeli inventor with a dream.
There are a number of limitations to the existing oxygen tank underwater breathing method. The first is the amount of time a diver can stay underwater, which is the result of the oxygen tank capacity. Another limitation is the dependence on oxygen refueling facilities near the diving site which are costly to operate and are used to compress the gas into the tanks which might be dangerous if not handled properly. The final problem has to do with the actual use of oxygen tanks underwater. When these tanks are in use they empty out and change the balance of the diver in the water.
Engineers have tried to overcome these limitations for many years now. Nuclear submarines and the international space station use systems that generate Oxygen from water by performing 'Electrolysis', which is chemical separation of Oxygen from Hydrogen.
These systems require very large amounts of energy to operate. For this reason, smaller, diesel fueled submarines cannot use these systems and are required to resurface to re-supply their oxygen tanks every so often. Divers can't even consider carrying such large machines not to mention supplying them with energy. To overcome this limitation an Israeli inventor, Alon Bodner, turned to fish.
Fish do not perform chemical separation of oxygen from water; instead they use the dissolved air that exists in the water in order to breathe. In the ocean the wind, waves and underwater currents help spread small amounts of air inside the water. Studies have shown that in a depth of 200m below the sea there is still about 1.5% of dissolved air. This might not sound like much but it is enough to allow both small and large fish to breathe comfortably underwater. Bodner’s idea was to create an artificial system that will mimic the way fish use the air in the water thus allowing both smaller submarines and divers to get rid of the large, cumbersome oxygen tanks.
The general structure of the system
The system developed by Bodner uses a well known physical law called the "Henry Law" which describes gas absorption in liquids. This law states that the amount of gas that can be dissolved in a liquid body is proportional to the pressure on the liquid body. The law works in both directions – lowering the pressure will release more gas out of the liquid. This is done by a centrifuge which rotates rapidly thus creating under pressure inside a small sealed chamber containing sea water. The system will be powered by rechargeable batteries. Calculations showed that a one kilo Lithium battery can provide a diver with about one hour of diving time.
Alon Bodner
Bodner has already built and tested a laboratory model and he is on the path to building a full-scale prototype. Patents for the invention have already been granted in Europe and a similar one is currently pending examination in the U.S. Meetings have already been held with most major diving manufacturers as well as with the Israeli Navy. Initial financial support for the project has been given by Israel Ministry of Industry and Commerce and Bodner is currently looking for private investors to help complete his project.
If everything goes according to plan, in a few years the new tankless breathing system will be operational and will be attached to a diver in the form of a vest that will enable him to stay underwater for a period of many hours.
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