Council 'sorry' over cremation
Council bosses have apologised to a grieving Black Country family after cremating their great-grandmother and failing to tell them she had died.Council bosses have apologised to a grieving Black Country family after cremating their great-grandmother and failing to tell them she had died. Dorothy Cushman's family have rejected Walsall Council's offer of £1,500 compensation and are demanding a full investigation after discovering what happened to the 83-year-old. They claim she wanted to be buried alongside her husband George at Bloxwich Cemetery, Field Road, and had paid for the plot. Social services bosses who were responsible for the care of the pensioner, who was originally from the Beechdale Estate, have admitted they acted incorrectly and should not have cremated Mrs Cushman. Read the full story in the Express & Star
Council bosses have apologised to a grieving Black Country family after cremating their great-grandmother and failing to tell them she had died.
Dorothy Cushman's family have rejected Walsall Council's offer of £1,500 compensation and are demanding a full investigation after discovering what happened to the 83-year-old.
They claim she wanted to be buried alongside her husband George at Bloxwich Cemetery, Field Road, and had paid for the plot.
Social services bosses who were responsible for the care of the pensioner, who was originally from the Beechdale Estate, have admitted they acted incorrectly and should not have cremated Mrs Cushman.Mrs Cushman, known as Dolly, was a resident at Newlyn Court in Bilston, Wolverhampton, which is a specialist home for Parkinson's Disease sufferers.
Mrs Cushman's grandson Kelvin, aged 30, of Goscote Close, said his grandmother's friend Barbara Day went to visit her at the home on November 29 and was stunned when staff took her into a side room and said Mrs Cushman had died on October 13.
He admitted they weren't "the closest of families" but said their details had always been left with the council as Mrs Cushman's next of kin.
