Robert Bush “caused anguish and pain on a scale beyond comprehension”, a judge said after a disgraced funeral director who failed to bury or cremate people and gave bereaved relatives the ashes of strangers was jailed for 20 years.
Bush admitted 67 offences after 35 bodies and more than 100 sets of ashes were found by police raiding Legacy Independent Funeral Directors in Hull in March 2024.
At Hull Crown Court, Judge Justice Hilliard told the former undertaker he had “caused anguish and pain on a scale beyond comprehension”.
He also barred Bush, who defrauded nearly 200 families out of £500,000, from being a company director for 14 years.
Hilliard told the sentencing hearing:
“I have no doubt that the defendant behaved in such a deceitful way because of financial greed.”
“He must have a heartless side to him - which allowed him to treat the living and the dead in the way he did, and he was very confident he would get away with what he was doing.”
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