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Post by Joanna on Aug 23, 2015 17:07:50 GMT -5
Young Woman's Body Stolen from Texas Funeral HomeA 25-year-old woman’s body was stolen from her casket in a San Antonio funeral home in broad daylight, baffling police and forcing her family to deal with losing her a second time. Julie Mott (above) died August 8 following a life-long battle with cystic fibrosis, a genetic disease that causes persistent lung infections and limits the ability to breathe. Her body was stolen after her funeral in San Antonio August 15 – which would have been her 26th birthday – Sgt. Javier Salazar told the Daily News.
The next morning, when staff members were preparing to take her for cremation, they found the casket had been broken into and Mott’s body was missing. But there were no signs of forced entry at the Mission Parks Funeral Chapel North and no alarms had sounded or been tampered with overnight. This means her body was likely taken from a private viewing area between the end of the service at 1:30 p.m. and 4:30 p.m. the following day. “Whoever did it was pretty daring about it,” Salazar said, noting the crime could have been committed by just one person or a group because Mott was a petite lady. As to motive, “the possibilities are endless” and police will wait until they have apprehended a suspect to say why the crime occurred, he said. “Our No. 1 priority, of course, is getting her back to her family,” he added. “A close second is to find out who the person was who did it and bring them to justice.”
Julie’s father, Tim Mott, begged for help finding his daughter’s body. “We just want our daughter’s remains returned so we can have some closure to our grief,” he implored, according to KHOU.
The situation is especially heart-wrenching because Mott was expected to live to no more than 3-years-of-age, Salazar said. But her family “encouraged her to live” and have fun. She became a “vibrant, typical young girl” who loved to horseback ride but spent many days bedridden, he added. “It’s heartbreaking to see a family that went through all that with her…now being put through this before being able to go through mourning and get the closure any family needs.”
Friends mourned the second loss of the San Antonio College graduate who brought joy into their lives, despite her pain. “So disturbing and unbelievable that someone would do this. RIP Julie and prayers to your family in this horrible time,” friend Jessica Payne wrote.
“My dear Julie, the girls and I will not rest until you do,” friend Bryan Cornwell wrote on a memorial page. “It’s been a mean world without you. I love you more than life itself.”
The body theft is the first in the funeral home’s 108-year history. The crime is not common. “This is an unprecedented and unthinkable event and we are doing everything in our power to cooperate with the ongoing police investigation,” funeral director Robert Tips said in a statement.
The funeral home’s owners are close friends with the Mott family and knew Julie since she was born, making them “outraged” by “this shameful act,” Tips said. “They are a wonderful family and the loss of their daughter was a heavy burden for them to bear.”
The funeral home is offering a $20,000 reward for information leading to the body’s discovery. Anyone with information is asked to call 210-225-TIPS.Source: Rachelle Blinder, The New York Daily News, August 22, 2015.
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Post by madeline on Aug 23, 2015 20:51:39 GMT -5
She's a pretty girl, so the body was probably taken by some necrophiliac. What other reason would there be to steal a corpse?
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Post by natalie on Aug 25, 2015 20:18:53 GMT -5
Madeline, you're probably right about that. I am surprised that the funeral home would not have any cameras, either inside the home or outside, on the grounds or in the parking lot. This also took place in the daytime, so unless this home is in a very isolated area and there were no staff members working that day (which makes no sense if the home was open to the public), I just cannot understand how someone would be able to smuggle a corpse out of the building and not be noticed.
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Post by pat on Sept 19, 2015 18:15:54 GMT -5
Does anyone know if they ever found this woman's body?
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Post by Graveyardbride on Mar 15, 2016 5:37:55 GMT -5
The Missing Body of Julie Mott: Family Files Lawsuit, Suspect Named
The family of Julie Mott, whose body was stolen from a local funeral home on what would have been her 26th birthday, is suing the business for gross negligence. Attorney Alex Katzman said the Motts were seeking almost $1 million in damages from San Antonio’s Mission Park Funeral Chapels North after their daughter’s body mysteriously vanished following her funeral on August 15, 2015.
Police have so far focused their investigation on Julie’s ex-boyfriend, who has been described as “obsessed” with the beautiful blonde before and after her death from cystic fibrosis, though he has strenuously denied any involvement in the theft of her remains.
The San Antonio funeral home is owned by longtime family friend Robert “Dick” Tips, for whom Julie’s father Tim once worked as a private pilot. “Mission lost possession of Julie Mott’s body and to this day has been unable to explain how,” the lawsuit states. “The family has no idea where their daughter’s body is, and they don’t know if there will ever be a final resting place where they can visit and have that sense of connectiveness,” Katzman told the San Antonio Express-News. “This is the only case that I know of where they just lost the body, and we haven’t seen any real effort by Mission Park to step up and try and find it.”
Tips has offered a $20,000 reward for information leading to the return of Julie’s remains. He refused to discuss the latest developments in this horror case with reporters, but a statement from his company said: “Unfortunately, we haven’t received the lawsuit yet, so we can’t comment on the complaint itself. However, at Mission Park, we’ve never believed this theft was an issue of money, it’s always been about finding Julie’s remains and helping the police locate the person who committed this crime.”
Did ‘obsessed’ ex-boyfriend steal Julie’s corpse? It’s the stuff of nightmares. A beautiful young woman was bombarded with unwanted calls and text messages for weeks as she lay dying in the hospital. The stalker, an ex-boyfriend Julie, 25, dated for six years and hadn’t seen for two, continued his “obsessive” campaign right up until her death from cystic fibrosis – an illness she’d battled since the age of two.
Julie’s service at the Mission Park North Funeral Chapel in San Antonio was packed to capacity with family and friends. She was loved. The stalker was there too. He was annoyed Julie’s father wouldn’t make eye contact with him. It was Julie’s wish to be cremated and following the service, her embalmed body was wheeled away to a viewing suite for those who wanted to see her one last time. The ex-boyfriend was one of those who wanted to see her and staff would later tell police he was the last to leave. The next morning, employees preparing to transfer the young woman’s casket to an off-site crematory discovered it empty. The unthinkable had happened: Julie’s body had been stolen. The date was Saturday, August 15, 2015, which would have been her 26th birthday. Her corpse hasn’t been seen since.
Later, an incident report obtained by MySanAntonio would reveal police had identified a potential suspect who was reportedly texting and calling Julie “obsessively” before her death. The name of the man, in his 20s, had been blacked out before reporters viewed the document and subsequent media articles would refer to him only as “SP1.” In October, SP1 started posting a series of bizarre messages to a forum frequented by Julie, My Death Space. She’d been a fan of the site for years; it was a place in which she could use her dark sense of humor to cope with her illness without being judged. The first post by user “Heartbroken1” began by identifying himself as the “obsessed man” spoken of by police and he went on at length concerning his feelings for Julie and the history of their relationship. He described the funeral in detail, the snub by her family, his annoyance at a conversation between Julie’s mother and Dick Tips regarding flowers (he believed it was frivolous and inappropriate timing). Yes, he was the last person to view Julie’s body but no, he didn’t take her, he wrote.
Once other forum users established he was genuine, they were generous with their sympathy. Encouraged, Heartbroken1 continued to share, then over-share. His posts became weirder and more rambling, arousing the suspicions of others. Things did not add up. It got creepy. Maybe this guy really did take Julie, others wondered in their posts. The more they challenged his story, the more he blabbed, digging the hole deeper. He eventually revealed his real name (keep reading).
‘Whoever Took Her Couldn’t Have Loved Her More than I Do.’ In late August, Julie’s parents made a direct appeal to the perpetrator, whom they and police described as “someone they believe they know.” Through tears, Sharlotte Mott pleaded, “We ask that you please, please return our Julie to us. I was her caregiver, the one who drove her to her doctor’s visits, stayed with her throughout her many hospital stays and, in her later years, her best friend. Without a doubt, she loved me as much as I loved her. This selfish person who took her could not have loved her any more than I do. I did everything in my power to fulfill her wishes. The fact that I cannot fulfill her final wishes (of being cremated) is unbearable. It is breaking my heart each and every day.”
Tim Mott said he was furious his daughter could not be laid to rest and that the person who stole her was twisted, mentally ill. “What else could it be?” he asked rhetorically. “The person’s got to be sick.”
Heartbroken1 acknowledged in several posts on MyDeathSpace that police had raided his home and the home of his parents, but found nothing. Investigators appeared to act on allusions made by Heartbroken1 in the forum to places that were special when he and Julie were together, searching forest trails and lookouts.
Heartbroken1 started posting malicious stories about Julie’s family, alleging they had virtually cut him off from Julie when they shared an apartment for several years, even as her condition deteriorated. The stories appeared to be aimed at disproving Julie’s mother’s statement that he “could not have loved her more” than she. He claimed the struggle to cope with Julie’s illness led him to self-medicate. He told the MyDeathSpace forum the lack of support from Julie’s family led him to develop a nasty Adderall (amphetamine) and alcohol habit. The two eventually split and she moved back home two years before her death. He also shared a number of conversations on Julie’s Facebook page between her brother, Jon Mott, and himself, in which he claimed to have hired private investigators to find out who had taken Julie. From the start, he pointed the finger at funeral home staff and mentioned a detail not released by police – that her casket appeared to have been “tampered” with.
Heartbroken1 Outs Himself. When Julie’s brother discovered the MyDeathSpace thread on his sister, he all but accused Heartbroken1 of stealing her body. In response, Heartbroken1 outed himself as Julie’s ex-boyfriend of six years, Bill Wilburn, by inviting users to “stalk me for 24 hours” and take a look at his photographic tribute to Julie on his Facebook page (which was deleted when he was questioned, but reactivated less than 24 hours later).
Posting as user Heartbroken.my.ass, Jon Mott wrote: "Greetings all. I’m Julie’s brother. My family and I have been monitoring this site for a little while now. I just wanted to come on here because I know this is one of Bill’s outlets and no doubt will be reading this.
"Bill, Stop being such a chicken shit and take the polygraph that you originally agreed to take on 8/16. It’s been three months. Your constant flip-flopping of 'I’ll take the polygraph' to 'No, my mom doesn’t want me to take it' is getting on everyone’s last nerves. And now you want us to believe that you’ll take it but have a local news station do it opposed to SAID? Enough of your bullsshit lies.
"Everyone knows you didn’t hire private investigators. I mean, come on. Why would you hire private detectives in Austin when the crime occurred in San Antonio? Doesn’t make sense. Just take the polygraph with SAID. If you pass, they can move on from you as the suspect. Hell, you said yourself, it’s inadmissible in court. What do you have to lose?"
Bill Wilburn, posting as Heartbroken1, again denied Mott’s accusations, claiming he did not believe anyone stole Julie’s body, but that she had been misplaced by the funeral home or cremated prematurely. But Mott persisted, claiming his family had asked Mr Tips to watch him at the funeral in case he stole something:
"Bill ... I can remember saying she looked beautiful and I remember pointing out to you that the crease in her elbow was still soft," Jon Mott replied to Wilburn in the above MyDeathSpace post. "I remember you hugging me and telling me that you loved me like a brother. I remember thinking 'man, I’m glad I’ll never have to see this guy again.' I remember thinking it was weird that you stayed back to be the last person to say goodbye to Julie. I thought that was disrespectful to the family. I thought it was extremely disrespectful that when I got up to speak, you left your seat in the back of the chapel, walked up the center isle, and sat where I was seated. Next to my wife and my parents. Like you were a part of the family. I’ve got big news for you, bud, you’re not a part of our family. I remember as we were walking out, my dad telling the funeral director to watch you because you might steal something. Oh the fucking irony of that one! So remind me what did I say that was so creepy?
"Let’s talk about flowers. The reason why I’m not going to ask Dick why they didn't discover Julie’s body missing until after we picked flowers up on Sunday, is because I fucking know why. I’m just not going to help you develop your timeline.
"Disrespecting my sister? How? By trying to find out who stole her?
"The reason you won’t take the polygraph is because you know you’re going to fail it. And be exposed as the sick fucker you are. The sick fucker who drives by the house asking for Julie to peek out the window just so you can see her, which she never did. The sick fucker who comes over in the middle of the night and finds Julie [sic] truck unlocked. How long did you sit in the truck, Bill? I believe Julie said two hours. Why don’t you tell the nice people what you took as a keepsake? Was it a brush? Or was it a headband? I honestly can’t remember.
"Now to your 'after the funeral' story. I’m not going to give you the details, but I know at least one stop you made that you’ve never brought up. Was it good seeing her?"
In the meantime, Wilburn continues to declare his love for Julie online and protest his innocence. Police have confirmed several raids have been carried out on his home and premises belonging to his relatives.
No arrests have been made and Julie’s body remains missing.
Source: RealLife, January 22, 2016.
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Post by kitty on Mar 15, 2016 11:14:59 GMT -5
Her stalker almost had to be the one who took her body, but why haven't the police found any evidence? I'm sure that they've been watching him.
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Post by catherine on Mar 15, 2016 15:34:38 GMT -5
This reminds me of that kooky guy in Key West, FL, who kept the body of the woman called Eleana for years before anyone ever found out what he was doing.
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Post by natalie on Mar 15, 2016 15:51:33 GMT -5
I don't understand why or how a funeral home does not have cameras. It would be in their best interest, in case jewelry from the deceased goes missing, for example, so they can find the thief and charge him with a crime, or if an employee is a necrophiliac, the cameras would capture that act too. I have seen cameras at the few funeral homes I have attended. I think this funeral home would benefit by putting cameras inside to make sure bodies are not improperly tampered with.
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Post by amaleen6 on Mar 25, 2016 12:13:27 GMT -5
What a sad, sick story this is. It has to be this ex-boyfriend. I wonder if he's rented any storage space somewhere.
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Post by jason on Apr 3, 2016 20:02:26 GMT -5
I don't understand why or how a funeral home does not have cameras. It would be in their best interest, in case jewelry from the deceased goes missing, for example, so they can find the thief and charge him with a crime, or if an employee is a necrophiliac, the cameras would capture that act too. I have seen cameras at the few funeral homes I have attended. I think this funeral home would benefit by putting cameras inside to make sure bodies are not improperly tampered with. I don't know of any funeral home that has cameras on the inside. This would be an invasion of privacy of the worst kind. People don't want their grief videotaped.
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Post by natalie on Feb 15, 2018 16:47:51 GMT -5
New Suspect Revealed During Trial: Employee 'Into Satan'
Elaine Aradillas, People, February 13, 2018
The family of a deceased San Antonio woman whose body went missing from her casket has sued the funeral parlor for negligence, with their attorneys alleging they allowed an embalming company with an employee who was “into Satan” access to the body, according to court records and published reports.
The pending lawsuit went to trial three weeks ago and a jury was expected to begin deliberations Tuesday. But in an unexpected twist last week, the family’s attorney questioned a third party embalming contractor about an employee’s social media posts, according to reports in the San Antonio Express-News. “He’s testified he’s into Satan,” Alex Katzman, an attorney representing the Mott family, said in court. “Did you know that?”
“No,” replied Frederick Beyer, an owner of Beyer & Beitel Mortuary Services, which embalmed Julie Mott. “I didn’t know anything about Satan.”
“Is there any concern in regard with him having access to departed loved ones,” Katzman asked.
“No,” Beyer responded.
Mott’s family has accused the funeral home owners of using third-party contractors to transport bodies to be prepared for burial or cremation, and allege the company provides numerous people access to the facilities with security codes that haven’t been changed in decades, the Express-News reported.
In closing arguments Tuesday, attorneys for the Mott family accused someone associated with the third-party contractor of taking the young woman’s body, according to local TV station KSAT-12.
Mott’s mother Sharlotte told jurors last week that she is heartbroken because she has been unable to bury her daughter. “Her urn sits empty,” Sharlotte cried. “We can’t even put a picture [on it]. She’s not there.”
Meanwhile, a criminal trial associated with the case is expected to begin in April. Mott’s ex-boyfriend, Bill Willburn. was arrested last year and charged with two counts of criminal trespassing. “The [suspect] had been invited to the service the day before and had been the last to leave,” a police report obtained by People states. “[The suspect] had been obsessed with [Julie Mott] calling and texting.” In two separate incidents, Wilburn was spotted trying to gain entry to the funeral home after a criminal trespass notice was filed against him, according to police reports. San Antonio police obtained a warrant to collect a DNA sample from Wilburn, according to the TV station.
“I think he’s being a little disingenuous and I don’t think that he’s giving us all the information that we need,” SAPD spokesman Sgt. Jesse Salame told KSAT-12. “And he certainly hasn’t been what I would call overly cooperative.” Police officials have not called Wilburn a suspect in Mott’s disappearance.
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Post by madeline on Feb 15, 2018 18:20:25 GMT -5
It looks like the boyfriend may not have been the one who stole the body after all.
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Post by Graveyardbride on May 14, 2018 13:25:34 GMT -5
Parents Awarded $8 Million for Daughter’s Stolen Corpse, Ex-Boyfriend Spends 2 Days in JailThe parents of the 25-year-old woman whose body went missing from a San Antonio funeral home have been awarded $8 million for the funeral home’s negligence.
In 2015, after Julie Mott died of complications from cystic fibrosis, her parents Sharlotte and Timothy Mott contracted Mission Park Funeral Chapels & Cemeteries for their daughter’s funeral services. Julie’s memorial service was held at the funeral home August 15, 2015, but the following day, before she was to be cremated, funeral home employees discovered her corpse was gone. The young woman’s body has never been found.
The trial in the lawsuit filed by the Mott family against the funeral home last three weeks and on February 13, the jury determined the funeral home (owned by Kristin and Robert “Dick” Tips) was negligent.
The Motts accused the Tips of failing to secure their funeral homes, alleging outside contractors had unrestricted access to the building and the lack of security could explain how their daughter’s body went missing. The Tips denied responsibility for the incident, instead attempting to place blame on Julie’s ex-boyfriend Bill Wilburn (above), however, the jury determined Wilburn had not stolen his former girlfriend’s corpse in order to keep her from being cremated.
At one point in the trial, the focus shifted to a third-party employee, Nicholas Moreno, who was accused of practicing Satanism. Moreno worked for Beyer & Beitel Mortuary Services, the company that handles embalming for Mission Park, and was criticized for having “Satanic” or “demonic” images on his Facebook page, which led to suspicion that he might be involved in the disappearance. But Moreno never came into contact with Mott’s body, according to his boss, who testified in the case, and the images on his Facebook page pertained to music – Moreno plays in a band – the San Antonio Express-News reported.
The Motts were each awarded $1.5 million for mental anguish already suffered and an additional $2.5 million for mental anguish they will likely suffer in the future. The trial did not explain Julie Mott’s disappearance, nor did it lead to the recovery of her remains.
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In April, Bill Wilburn, Julie Mott’s ex-boyfriend, was sentenced to two days in jail after pleading guilty to trespassing on the property of Mission Park Funeral Home. Wilburn was charged with criminal trespass in June 2016, almost a year after Mott’s body was taken from her casket.
Following the theft of the corpse, Wilburn began harassing several people involved in the case in an effort to obtain information. According to one police report, he called Mission Park staff in excess of 200 times in one day and on September 2, 2015, he was issued a criminal trespass notice. On June 26 and 29, 2016, he was spotted by Mission Park employees and captured on security camera footage attempting to gain entrance to the funeral home and was later arrested on two charges of criminal trespass.
According to court records, he pled guilty to one of the charges on March 28 and was sentenced to two days in jail. He was also fined $100, according to officials in County Court 12, where his trial was held. Source: Lyanne A. Guarecuco, The San Antonio Current, February 14, 2018, and Caleb Downs, MySanAntonio, April 3, 2018.
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Post by pat on May 14, 2018 17:39:30 GMT -5
So neither the boyfriend nor the Satanist stole the body, so who does that leave? I hope that investigators checked out the family. There are people who will do just about anything for money and now the parents are $8 million richer.
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Post by serena on May 11, 2023 19:09:18 GMT -5
I don't know how I missed this! It's now been almost 8 years: have there been any leads at all? How do you just walk out of a funeral home with a corpse?
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