Household Discovered Cherished One Is not Useless After Cremating Physique, Holding Funeral

That is the wild story being shared by Rochester resident Shanita Hopkins, who opened as much as WROC about her household’s scenario, after studying her sister Shanice Crews was noticed in Detroit months after police stated she died.

Based on Hopkins, her household reported Crews lacking in July 2021, after she stopped speaking with them and left behind her two youngsters. Then, in April 2024, native police stated she died in February that very same yr in an empty lot from a drug overdose, with an post-mortem report discovering excessive ranges of cocaine in her physique.

Hopkins took that as a shock and commenced questioning if her sister had been drugged, suggesting she did not use cocaine. “Did any individual like lace her?” stated Hopkins, talking with WROC.

Hopkins stated that as a result of the physique was so badly decomposed, it was cremated instantly, earlier than a funeral and memorial service had been held in Might 2024.

Months later, every little thing modified for the household, nonetheless, when Hopkins acquired a random message from a stranger in Detroit.

“Ma’am, I am involved your sister just isn’t lifeless,” learn the message, which got here with a photograph of a girl who Hopkins stated is her sibling. “She simply volunteered at my occasion at this time,” the message added. Hopkins’ instant response to them was, “wtf.”

“Only a random message,” she informed WROC, earlier than she reached out to the Monroe County Medical Examiner’s Workplace, exhibiting them the pictures and messages. She claimed they insisted the dental information had been a match.

Extra DNA assessments had been completed towards different members of the family, with Hopkins saying they did not come again as a match — which means the stays weren’t Shanice’s. Hopkins stated she now believes the medical expert was “mendacity to my face” in regards to the dental information — telling the outlet, “they could not discover out who this was they usually needed to shut a lacking individual’s case. That is nearly how I really feel.”

Making issues worse, Hopkins stated the household made necklaces with among the ashes from each the girl they thought was Shanice and their late mom — saying, “we blended my mother with this stranger.” The extra ashes, she claimed, had been returned to the medical expert upon their request.

Whereas it has been a difficult scenario for the household — and one which has left them reportedly weighing authorized choices for his or her “ache and struggling” — there’s a silver lining.

“She’s simply nonetheless a lacking individual to us, however she’s alive and nicely,” stated Hopkins, who nonetheless hasn’t heard from her sister instantly.

When requested to touch upon the incident, the Medical Examiner informed the outlet they had been “unable to touch upon particular instances,” whereas insisting they use “trade customary scientific strategies to determine stays of deceased people in a well timed method and make acceptable notifications to households.”