*The Louisiana State Board revoked Gary Lewis's funeral director license. He appealed. The appeal gave him a stay. He kept operating. Weeks later, a sheriff evicted the business and the coroner found 16 bodies inside.*
On July 16, 2026, the Orleans Parish Sheriff's Office executed a court-ordered eviction at New Orleans Funeral and Cremation Service. The business operated out of 9200 I-10 Service Road. Its owner was Gary Lewis.
Two days later, the New Orleans Coroner's Office arrived to take emergency custody of what was inside: 16 human bodies and 12 sets of cremated remains. The coroner's office stated its role was to "secure and safely take custody of human remains" because the business could no longer operate.
The Louisiana State Board of Embalmers and Funeral Directors had already revoked Lewis's license before the eviction. But Lewis had appealed the revocation to a higher court. The appeal triggered an automatic stay. Under that stay, Lewis was legally permitted to continue operating a funeral home whose license the state had already taken away.
The eviction ended that arrangement. What it revealed is still being sorted out.
By the Numbers
The license revocation nobody enforced
The timeline is the story. The Louisiana State Board of Embalmers and Funeral Directors revoked Lewis's license before the eviction. Lewis appealed that decision to a higher court. Under Louisiana's administrative review process, the appeal placed the revocation on hold.
That hold is called a stay. It meant the revocation existed on paper but could not be enforced while the appeal was pending. Lewis remained a licensed funeral director in the eyes of anyone who walked into his business. Families continued bringing him their dead.
The board confirmed this sequence to WDSU. The revocation was real. The appeal was real. The stay was real. So was the business operating throughout.
This is not a loophole unique to Louisiana. Administrative stays are standard in professional licensing across the United States. When a state board revokes a license, the licensee typically has a right to appeal. In many jurisdictions, filing the appeal pauses the revocation. The professional keeps working during the months or years the appeal takes to resolve.
The system is designed to protect licensees from wrongful revocation. It is not designed to protect the families walking through the door of a funeral home the state has already determined should be closed.
What families experienced
Michael Lajaunie's father died after a two-year battle with cancer. Lajaunie told WDSU he paid Lewis to fast-track an insurance claim for a fee. He received a bounced check for $19,000.
"I was never able to grieve my father's death because there was something always on the plate for two years," Lajaunie said.
Lewis denied keeping the insurance money. He told WDSU the funds were held by a third-party funding company. He claimed he attempted to refund Lajaunie with a cashier's check but that Lajaunie refused to sign for it. Lewis said he later paid an additional $2,500 to resolve the dispute. Lajaunie told WDSU he eventually received payment in 2026.
Dionya James approached a WDSU reporter during an interview with Lewis. She said she paid $1,700 and had been waiting since May for her husband's twin brother's ashes. Her husband's twin brother died of cancer.
"I am looking for Lonnie's ashes," James said.
Lewis, who was on the phone during the interaction, responded: "His remains are ready." He added: "I may have one of the admins deliver him to you this afternoon. Sorry for the inconvenience, Ms. James; you have my condolences."
James told WDSU that evening that they finally received a box of ashes with their loved one's name on it, after the reporter's involvement. The coroner's office noted that identifying the 12 sets of seized cremated remains would be "incredibly difficult" without proper labels.
The decomposition lawsuit
On July 30, 2026, a family filed a civil lawsuit in Orleans Parish Civil District Court. The complaint alleges that their mother's body was allowed to decompose while in the facility's care.
The suit claims the body was not timely embalmed or refrigerated. Fluids leaked. An open casket service became impossible. The family is seeking damages for the condition in which they received their mother's remains.
This lawsuit is separate from the eviction and the license revocation. It is a direct claim by a family about what happened to a specific body inside a specific building. It will move through civil court on its own timeline.
The appeals stay problem
The gap between revocation and enforcement is a feature of how professional licensing works in most states.
When a medical board, a funeral board, or any occupational licensing agency revokes a license, the licensee has due process rights. Those rights include appealing the decision to a court. In many states, filing the appeal triggers an automatic stay that prevents the revocation from taking effect until the court rules.
The purpose is sound. A wrongful revocation could destroy a business and a career. The stay protects the professional while the court reviews the case.
What happens to the public during that window receives less attention. A funeral home whose license has been revoked is, by the board's own determination, a business the state has concluded should not be operating. But families arriving at the arrangement table have no way of knowing that. There is no requirement in Louisiana, or in most states, that a funeral home post a notice of license revocation or pending appeal on its premises or website.
Families trust the system. They see a business operating openly. They assume that means the state has approved it. In this case, the state had done the opposite. The state had revoked approval. The appeals process kept that revocation invisible.
What Louisiana could do
Louisiana's funeral board did its job. It investigated, found cause, and revoked the license. The breakdown happened at the enforcement layer, where the appeals stay allowed continued operation.
Several approaches exist in other states that Louisiana and other jurisdictions could adopt:
- Public posting requirement. When a license is revoked and an appeal is filed, require the business to post notice of the revocation and pending appeal in a visible location. Families entering the business would know the state has already moved to shut it down.
- Supervised operations during appeal. Instead of allowing unrestricted operation, require a court-appointed monitor or supervisor during the appeal period. The business continues to function, but financial transactions and body handling are overseen.
- Escrow requirement during appeal. Require the business to place incoming payments into an escrow account rather than direct collection. If the appeal fails and the business closes, families who paid in advance have a fund to draw from.
- Immediate suspension for public safety. Some states allow a board to seek an immediate suspension, separate from the revocation, when there is evidence of ongoing harm to the public. This is faster than waiting for the full appeal process. Whether Louisiana's statute includes this option is a question for the state legislature to answer.
None of these options requires inventing a new regulatory framework. They adjust the timeline of when enforcement actually reaches the public.
What families can do now
The New Orleans Coroner's Office has asked any family affected by the closure of New Orleans Funeral and Cremation Service to contact them directly at 504-658-9660. The office is working to identify the 16 bodies and 12 sets of cremated remains recovered from the facility.
Families who paid for services they did not receive can file complaints with the Louisiana State Board of Embalmers and Funeral Directors. They can also consult with a civil attorney about recovery options, as the July 30 lawsuit demonstrates.
The civil case filed in Orleans Parish Civil District Court shows one path. Other families in similar situations may have separate claims depending on the specific services they paid for and what they received.
The bigger question
New Orleans Funeral and Cremation Service is one business. Its collapse involved a single operation, not the broader New Orleans market. But the mechanism that let it keep operating, the appeals stay, is not unique to Louisiana or to this case.
Every state has some version of it. Every state allows professionals to appeal license revocations. And in most states, that appeal pauses the consequence.
The question is whether families deserve to know when the state has revoked a funeral home's license before they hand over their loved one and their money. Right now, in Louisiana and most other states, they do not.
*Sources: WDSU Investigates (Aubry Killion, "WDSU Investigates tracks down evicted funeral home owner," July 20, 2026); New Orleans Coroner's Office statement (July 2026); Orleans Parish Sheriff's Office statement (July 2026); Orleans Parish Civil District Court civil filing (July 30, 2026); Louisiana State Board of Embalmers and Funeral Directors (license revocation confirmation, July 2026); Attorney Laurie White statement to WDSU (July 2026).*
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