On Thursday, October 7, following a day and a half of testimony, a Christian County Circuit Court jury delivered a $165,000 judgement against Hopkinsville's Gamble Funeral Home, finding that employee Cletus Sivils misrepresented the condition of Thelma Johnson Buckner's body to her family following a fire at the dual funeral establishment and residence seven years ago.
According to Dora Gamble Bibbs, employee and sister of Gamble Funeral Home owner Raymond Gamble, he and his daughter had went out for dinner and returned to their apartment above the funeral parlor sometime after 10 p.m. on Saturday, December 13, 2003. At a quarter til midnight, a Hopkinsville police officer making his patrol rounds noticed the building on Liberty Street burning and found Raymond outside, having initially escaped with minimal injuries before venturing back into the flames to search for his teenage daughter, Angelique, who was not in the building. The desperate father's search resulted in considerable smoke inhalation and more than 85% of his body being burned, for which he was sent to the burn unit at Vanderbuilt Regional Medical Center in Nashville, Tennessee. Dora told reporters that though his injuries were serious ~ smoke inhalation necessitating a ventilator and burn damage requiring extensive skin grafts ~ her brother "was in good spirits" and was expected to recover, "but it might take three or four months," added another brother Joe Gamble, who also works at the funeral home. Doctors began the first round of skin grafts on December 16, followed by the second and final round on December 22. In stable but critical condition, Raymond spent that Christmas without visitors, gifts, or floral "Get Well" gestures, his traumatic burns and subsequent treatment demanding a sterile environment.
Firefighters were dispatched to the Gamble Funeral Home immediately following the patrol officer's notification and, upon arrival, found heavy smoke and fire raging in the historic building's second story living quarters. The fire, which eventually spread to the funeral parlor on the lower ground floor, ultimately took twenty-eight firefighters about two hours to bring under control. Hopkinsville Fire Chief Fagan Pace said the building appeared to be a total loss with then undetermined monetary damages, but congratulated his crew for saving the Red Bird Cafe building next door.
Sunday afternoon, the Christian County Rescue Squad and County Coronor Dorris Lamb's office assisted fire officials with the removal of three bodies that had been in the parlor at the time of the fire: 74 year-old Thelma Johnson Buckner; Anita Louise Radford Parker, 38; and Patricia Lisenby of St. Louis, for whom arrangements had not yet been made. The remains of these ladies were burned beyond recognition, information that would not come to the attention of their families or the pubic until long after they were buried.
Faced with a common and unfortunate predicament eventually dealt to all "family affair" establishments ~
Gamble Funeral Home's owner in critical condition, two of its employees being his siblings, and the whole organization likely a significantly impacted "part of the family" struggling to keep it together ~ the tragedy was discussed with the bereaved families of the three ladies whose bodies were pulled from the parlor and new funeral arrangements were made. Most of these dealings fell to funeral home employee Cletus Sivils ~
a surely distraught employee in an understandably chaotic situation, probably running around like a chicken with his head cut off ~ perhaps unfamiliar with dealing directly with bereaved families (perhaps not ~ still looking for more information on this case), but
most certainly unfamiliar with handling the matter of a family's deceased loved one enduring a blaze, a situation well-seasoned funerary veterans rarely encounter.
Visitation for 74 year-old Thelma Johnson Buckner was to be from 1 to 4 p.m. Sunday, followed by an early Monday afternoon service by Rev. Michael Torian at the Cedar Grove Baptist Church. October 2010 civil court testimony in the action brought against Gamble Funeral Home by Thelma's family somewhat conflicts regarding what Sivils relayed to the family as he offered to proceed with a closed-casket funeral - either that Thelma's body was badly blistered or that it had a "skin slip." The family obliged, not viewing Thelma's body before interring her at Cave Spring Cemetery. I'm not sure anyone would know if the "right" thing to do with what Sivils was faced with would be to tell a hopefully comforting fib or a likely agonizing truth ~ and I'm sure, as far as mental and emotional health goes, the "right" thing would vary among the masses.
38 year-old Anita Louise Radford Parker was to be laid out for viewing Monday from 4 to 7 p.m., with Rev. Roland Butler's services at the St. Bethlehem Baptist Church following at 2 p.m. the next day and burial at Pembroke Cemetery. Presumably, a conversation similar to what Thelma's family described took place regarding the condition of Anita's body after the fire. With the help of Hopkinsville's Lamb Funeral Home and Clarksville, Tennessee's Foston Funeral Home, Gamble employees proceeded with the deviated funeral plans.
Though by the 15th they were still unsure how the fire started and had not yet interviewed Gamble because of his injuries, officials indicated to the media that initial reports did not suggest arson or foul play. Investigators with the Kentucky Fire Marshal's office and Gamble's insurance carrier were scheduled to begin sifting through the debris on December 15 to determine the cause of the blaze. The assistance of Bowling Green Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms (ATF) office investigators was also requested due to the magnitude of the fire and possible complications associated with embalming chemicals and other matter typically found in funeral homes. Test results from samples sent to the ATF office in Washington D.C. took more a month to return, during which time investigators probed several areas of interest, there being no obvious clues to how the fire started, but some evidence it did not begin in the second floor living quarters, as initially believed.
Overseen by Dora and Joe and supported by many gracious funerary colleagues in and around the Hopkinsville community, Gamble Funeral Home continued doing business without their own parlor as Raymond recovered in Vanderbuilt's burn unit and insurance matters were resolved. A little more than a week after the fire, an office was set up in Red Bird Cafe building next door to the the funeral home's charred remains. As Hopkinsville and Christian County official historian William T. Turner recalls, the charred remains were once the primarily 1880's-constructed home of Dr. Gant Gaither's parents Nat and Rebecca, later converted to an apartment building under J. Hampton and Emma Fox. In the fall of 1953, Sam N. Henninger and partner Burt Lilly established the Henninger-Lilly Funeral Home, which later became simply the Henninger Funeral Home, joined in the business venture by his wife Shirley and parents. In 1986, Henninger sold the business to funeral home owners Tommy and Carolyn Maddux, who moved it to another location and sold the building to Raymond Gamble the same year. Raymond eventually recovered, rebuilt his funeral home, and returned to work.
On the night of the fire, authorities soon learned Angelique, the teenage daughter Raymond had risked his life searching for, had snuck away. Some weeks later, investigators did determine foul play was involved in the blaze - it had been set in the stairwell with some sort of flammable liquid, such as lighter fluid. Over the course of the year following the fire, arson investigator Lt. Elmer Greene and ATF Agent Jay Esponila (among others) put the pieces of the puzzle together, and it was claimed Angelique confessed to the crime in late 2004, though the story was muted because Angelique was a juvenile. On May 26, 2005, the
Christian Circuit Court (3
rd Dist.) certified her to stand trial as an adult, followed the next morning by a grand jury returning a first degree arson indictment. Raymond urged Commonwealth's Attorney Rick Boling to seek probation for his daughter, expressing he did not want the then 16 year-old girl, who lived with her mother in Texas, to be incarcerated. Represented by Foster Cothoff, Angelique entered an Alford plea to third degree arson and was sentenced to supervised probation and counseling in lieu of a five-year sentence by Judge Edwin White the same day ~ unusual in typically drawn out criminal cases, even more so in those causing the degree of damage and injury she did, Raymond's plea for lenience and closure gifting Angelique and her overloaded shopping cart of unfinished damage a highly undeserved spot in Justice's "10 items or less" Express line.
Authorities did not believe Angelique was trying to kill her father, but did believe she wanted to destroy the funeral home - a motive I'm not sure offered Raymond any consolation. I'm sure the reconstruction of his business and his daughter's return to Texas following her
conviction for destroying his business and historic home and leaving him with painful, life-threatening injuries sustained while ::SMACK IN THE FACE:: trying to make sure she was safe from a hell she created would have been a good time for Raymond to close what had to be one of the most unpleasant chapters of his life and begin healing. At least a good time to catch a breather! No such luck.
For reasons I'm sure are clarified in
Christian County Circuit court records I don't yet have access to (and perhaps in Nick Tabor's October 8, 2010 article
Jury awards $165K to Gamble plaintiff, which I'm hoping some gracious
Kentucky News Era subscriber will hook me up with), Thelma Bucker was exhumed about ten months after her death, exposing the charred condition of her body. For misrepresenting the condition of Thelma's body, a
$1.5 million lawsuit was then filed against the Gamble Funeral Home by her family ~ which, at the time of her death, included son Robert Alexander Kendrick, daughters Vanessa Marie Thomas and Juanita Greenwade, nine grandchildren (
one of whom is the NBA's Greg Bucker, born to then 14 year-old Juanita and raised in part by grandma Thelma) and eleven great grandchildren.
Not long after, Anita Parker's mother, Bertha Smith, also filed suit, which was still pending as of late 2010. I've not come across the details of the suit ~ such as if the same claim of misrepresentation is being made, or if Anita's body was also exhumed. I've found little information at all on Patricia Lisenby of St. Louis, but there's no indication anyone has come forward to file on behalf of her estate.
Though the reasons for a coroner to exhume a body are limited by Kentucky law (
KRS 72.440), my understanding of the statutes and administrative regulations ~ as detailed in
KRS 213.076 (Sect. 12),
901 KAR 5:090 (Sect. 2), and the
Kentucky Registrar Guidelines (KRG, Rev. 11/08, p. 48) ~ is that, provided Thelma's children were all in agreement (her husband could have trumped them if he were alive) and signed documents to such effect, they could submit to the Local Registrar a very simple
Form VS-36A: Application for Disinterment & Reinterment in the Same Cemetery, which does not inquire as to reasoning, be granted a
VS-36 Permit for Disinterment & Reinterment in the Same Cemetery (permit and required forms found in the
KRG, pp. 63-66), and take a peek once they'd jostled ole Thelma's casket out of the ground ~ though the statutes are unclear as to whether or not it is lawful to take a peek or otherwise handle a body once disinterred.
One can only hope there was a more legitimate reason to disturb this poor lady's sweet repose than plumping up her kids' wallets with money from a family and establishment that had been through enough. Thelma died at home, eliminating exhumation as part of an investigation into allegations of hospital or nursing home malpractice, but perhaps there was an inquiry of her primary doctor, a home nurse, medications, etc. I've not found any information or articles to support this, but I'm throwing this out there as a "perhaps" until I can review the court record or a media summary of it.
Its also possible her kids and grandkids were *truly* affected ~ mentally and emotionally ~ by the lingering unknown associated with Thelma's burial. Some of us folks are like that ~ I can see myself having nightmares and the like just thinking about my momma enduring the cold, damp darkness following the fire that Thelma, Anita, and Patricia were not pulled from til Sunday afternoon. If I weren't already a chronic insomniac, wondering whether or not she also suffered through the fiery blaze could definitely keep my mind racing at night and tear me up for a long time to come. On the other hand, so would knowing she
did suffer through the fire. Logically, of course I would know momma didn't *actually* suffer ~ but she'd still be my momma ~ and not all the belts and chains in our heads work logically. For similar reasons, some folks are adamantly against themselves or their loved ones being *voluntarily* cremated (this incident ironically flirting with those notions), while others shiver at the thought of being buried in the ground ~ creeped out by the darkness, bugs, and other known and unknown critters lurking underneath the surface. Logical people have seemingly irrational thoughts about such things all the time ~ the phenomenon certainly isn't rare.
But just because some other folks and I would struggle with these matters doesn't mean everyone would, or that the families of Thelma and Anita did ~ particularly to the tune of
$1.5 million when they were well aware the circumstances behind the matter at hand were unfortunate all around. American society and tort history has taught us we
should question the motives behind
any civil action, most particularly those with causes and monetary demands that seem frivolous, ridiculous, or plain outrageous...and with plaintiffs that aren't lawsuit-bashful.
After the death of her brother Robert on December 10, 2007, Juanita
filed suit against the
Christian County Fiscal Court,
Christian County Jail, and Bradley Boyd, in his individual capacity and official capacity as
Christian County Jailer for an unknown amount in damages, claiming a violation of Robert's civil rights caused his wrongful death, negligence, gross negligence, and outrage (intentional infliction of emotional distress). Though the case outline doesn't suggest the defendants certainly were squeaky clean, it also doesn't suggest they were grossly negligent, in any way responsible for a pulmonary embolism, or intended to outrage or inflict distress on anyone. Further, the case shows Juanita doesn't seem big on fact finding, research, neither basic nor challenging follow-up, and she
may not be above lying to achieve what she's after. In the suit, she claimed when she saw her brother on November 21 he "appeared to have lost more than 100 lbs." since he was incarcerated less than two months previous. An amazing and difficult feat in itself ~ made more amazing by his mid-December autopsy reporting a weight of 212 lbs. ~ 2 more than the 210 lb. weight recorded when he was arrested. Not to say coroners and medical examiners aren't above corruption and lying when handling jailhouse deaths - just saying civil plaintiffs aren't above lying and making frivolous claims either. The claim against the County was ultimately dismissed in November 2009. Following services at Brook Haven Memorial Funeral Home in December 2007, Robert Kendrick found much needed rest at Café Springs Cemetery.
Vanessa apparently died sometime between 2004 and November 2007,
Weatherstrand vs. Christian County Fiscal Court, et al. describing Juanita as Robert's "surviving sister" on November 21, 2007. After her brother's death, Juanita divorced her husband and remarried into the Weatherstrand family.
On October 7, 2010, a Christian County Circuit Court jury unanimously affirmed Cletus Sivils misrepresented the condition of Thelma's body to her children, finding Gamble Funeral Home liable for
$75,000 in emotional damages, $50,000 for medical expenses, $20,000 for funeral expenses, and $20,000 in punitive damages. The $165,000 judgement was about a tenth the amount Juanita was seeking.
I'd love to say that since a jury actually awarded these damages ~ particularly the punitive damages ~ I should assume the case against Gamble Funeral Home had more merit than the surface suggests and the motives of Cletus Sivils were less than honorable ~ but, historically, juries have not proven that assumption valid. Did Juanita and her family make for sympathetic plaintiffs, and, if so, was it because their issues were genuine or they were good at role-playing? Did Cletus Sivils stretch the truth with the good intention of saving the families further grief and agony, or was he simply trying to avoid a lawsuit? Had not misrepresenting the truth have saved Juanita and her family the emotional distress and medical expenses they claimed here? What provoked them to exhume their mother? Did Gamble or its insurance company make a reasonable offer inline with the ultimate judgement that the Buckner family refused? Were they at all sympathetic to the situation the Gamble family and their employees were in at the time of their mother's services? Did they hear word that Angelique Gamble was the culprit before the media broke the story? If so, would they have filed the suit had the funeral home been the victim of a random arsonist or freak accident?
Did Thelma's family disturb her eternal sleep solely for the purpose of filing a $1.5 million lawsuit?
