Family: Woman's Remains Were Wrongly Cremated, Lost

NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) -- A woman's remains were nowhere to be found Thursday -- a month after she passed away.

And as CBS2's Raegan Medgie reported, what was done with Consuelo Rivera's body before it disappeared is adding to her family's heartbreak.

"I love my mother. I love my mother very much," said Rivera's son, Emilio Irizarry.

Irizarry was in anguish as he talked about his mother, who passed away last month, and how he was still looking for remains to say goodbye.

"We can't even take her home because we don't know where she is," said Rivera's daughter-in-law, Keri Porcelli.

"They stole that from us," Irizarry added. "They stole my last kiss; my last goodbye."

Rivera's family first went to Biondi Funeral Home in Nutley, New Jersey. They changed their minds, deciding on services and burial with R.G. Ortiz Funeral Home in Brooklyn, whom they trusted to pick up Rivera's body.

The funeral home subcontracted First Avenue Funeral Services Inc. in East Harlem to pick up Rivera's body and make the transfer to Brooklyn. They did, but instead mistakenly took Rivera's body to New Jersey to get cremated.

"Devastating," Irizarry said.

"You lose your mom, your mother-in-law. There's grandchildren involved. And you can't even say goodbye," added Porcelli.

According to the family's lawyer, the family searched crematoriums in the area and thought they found their loved one's remains at Rosemont Crematorium in Elizabeth, New Jersey. It turned out those remains were those of someone else.

Even more gut-wrenchingly, First Avenue told the family they did not know where the remains were.

"It's not right," Irizarry said. "It's not right at all."

Biondi Funeral Home manager Anthony Biondi gave CBS2 the following statement: "Myself and our staff feel heartbroken about this...our responsibility to the Rivera family ended when Ortiz Funeral Home arrived at our funeral home to remove Mrs. Rivera."

As for the owner of R.G. Ortiz, he said he never had possession of the body, and was extremely sorry about what happened.