Carie Hallford decided to get a divorce after she was put back in jail in her state case in November 2024, which put her out of reach of her husband’s constant calls and texts and allowed the “fog in her mind from the years of abuse” to lift, according to a court filing by her lawyer, Robert Charles Melihercik.
Federal sentencing guidelines recommend prison time up to eight years since Carie Hallford didn’t have a criminal history. But lawyers for the government are asking U.S. District Judge Nina Y. Wang to sentence her to 15 years, in part for taking advantage of grieving people following one of the largest discoveries of decaying bodies at a funeral home in the U.S.
Families struggle with guilt, shame and nightmares
Those who entrusted their loved ones to the Hallfords struggled with guilt, shame, nightmares and panic attacks since the bodies were discovered in 2023. They were stacked so high in some places that they blocked doorways. There were bugs and maggots. Buckets had been placed to catch leaking fluids.
Prosecutors also want a longer sentence because the former couple, who had offered “green burials” without embalming, lavishly spent a pandemic-era small business loan on vehicles, cryptocurrency, pricey goods from stores like Gucci and Tiffany & Co. and laser body sculpting rather than on their Return to Nature funeral home in Colorado Springs.
Carie Hallford is asking to be sentenced to eight years. In court documents, Melihercik, said Hallford’s actions were motivated by “fear and severe anxiety.” He said Hallford’s former husband used “classic instruments of domestic violence” to control her, including threatening at times to kill himself and her.
Fremont County coroner Randy Keller and other authorities survey the area around the Return to Nature Funeral Home, where over 100 bodies have been improperly stored, on Oct. 7, 2023, in Penrose, Colo. AP
