Family Receives $115,000 After Woman’s Body Was Mistakenly Sent To Medical School

A family has received $115,000 from New York City after an elderly woman’s corpse was mistakenly sent to a medical school.  When Aura Ballesteros died in May 2014 the city medical examiner’s office told her son that they would hold his mother’s remains until June 16 so that he could have time to make funeral arrangements.  Hector Ballesteros was later in shock when he learned that his mother’s body was sent to the Albert Einstein College of Medicine in the Bronx.  The medical examiner’s office had previously called the morgue to tell them of the arrangement but someone at the morgue did not make a note of it.  There is a new state law pending in New York that would require family consent before releasing a body to a medical or embalming school. 

See Associated Press, Family Wins $115,000 From NYC After Morgue Mistakenly Sends Woman’s Body To Medical School, July 23, 2015.