Elliot Maurice Graham, the former director of Marion Graham Mortuaries in Jacksonville, has been sentenced to a five-year probation and is required to pay over $167,000 in restitution following a series of fraud and theft charges related to his funeral home operations. Graham, who was arrested last February, has also been barred from being licensed as a funeral home director after his disposition in Duval County court on Wednesday morning, according to a First Coast News report.
The accusations against Graham included mishandling the remains of clients and making false insurance claims in addition to grand and petit theft. Despite the severity of these charges, the legal proceedings led to a plea deal. As part of the agreement, all charges except for grand theft were dropped. The State Attorney's Office spokesman David Chapman said in a statement obtained by Action News Jax, "The individual victims have already been made whole; the restitution goes back to the Division of Funeral, Cemetery, and Consumer Services." However, some family members of the deceased have expressed dissatisfaction with the legal outcome.
Speaking to Action News Jax, Paula Wright and Sandra James, relatives of one of the mishandled bodies, felt that the punishment did not match the gravity of Graham's actions. "This hurts more than what he did," Wright stated. James added, "My family member’s body didn’t mean anything, you drop all the charges, and the only one you charge is about money. Come on, life is too precious."
Compounding the tragedy, a state inspector's visit to the mortuary premises in January 2024 revealed bodies left in insect-infested bags on gurneys in an embalming room where electricity had been shut off for months. The grim discovery highlighted a chilling negligence, as reported by The Florida Times-Union. Graham is mandated to pay the ordained restitution from the proceeds of the business sale, and his parents' estate, a move supported by law enforcement and former victims of the thefts.
As a condition of his guilty plea to grand theft charges and to resolve the remaining accusations, Graham has seen more than 13 months already spent behind bars credited towards his sentence. The resolution of the case safeguards the public from future misconduct by Graham in the funeral services industry since he can no longer be licensed in the state, as highlighted in a statement provided by the State Attorney's Office to The Florida Times-Union.
