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Daily Record
Daily Record
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Hannah Lucas & Chloe Burrell

Daughter's pain as funeral director allegedly holding dad's ashes 'hostage'

A devastated woman claims that a funeral director is holding her father's ashes "hostage".

Mikala Hill, 33, claims that she is still waiting for the funeral director to release them, two years after her father passed away.

She is afraid that she now may never get them back after she reports that a representative of Heavenly Services in Hull, which is now facing an uncertain future, left her a voicemail instructing her to come and collect them or risk them being placed in storage, as reported by Hull Live.

She said: "It's a possession. It's like holding him hostage. I don't want him stuck in a cupboard somewhere.

"It's made me distraught. I'm still sat here now without my dad. I can't grieve and I can't put him to rest, it's left me empty."

Mikala Hill, 33, said that she will be happy just to get her dad home from the funeral directors (Hull Live)

Her dad Russell Hill died in September 2019, aged 58, after battling muscular dsystrophy and having a stroke.

Two years on, she claims she has still not received his ashes from Heavenly Services, which is now subject to an investigation into alleged fraud by Humberside Police and is under fire from several disgruntled customers.

In one case, a woman claims she was told by the company to collect her dead husband's body from the morgue, while another woman claims funeral directors had never booked a plot for her dad's grave.

In her case, Ms Hill claims that she paid £1,650 in total to Heavenly Services in monthly instalments after being advised to pay that way by a staff member, despite having the money to pay outright.

"While I was paying I thought he was in safe hands. I was upset they wouldn't give me him back, but there was not a lot I could do," she stated, after receiving a call last week requesting her to pick up the ashes.

"They wouldn't give me his ashes because I didn't pay straight away, but now they've told me I've got to go get them right now.

"Why couldn't you have just given me them in the first place? It would have saved me a lot of heartache... It's all I can think about."

Mikala claims she was recently told by Heavenly Services that a new owner is taking over the premises and was advised to go down so they can give her the ashes.

Heavenly Services has been approached for comment.

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