Troubled Tennessee cemetery to re-open on limited basis

MEMPHIS, Tenn. – A Tennessee cemetery where hundreds of burials were mishandled is re-opening on a limited basis five years after it was shut down.

Tennessee’s Department of Commerce and Insurance said Wednesday that Galilee Memorial Gardens in the Memphis suburb of Bartlett will now be open on holidays and weekends, starting Saturday.

Investigations have revealed that the cemetery’s owners misplaced hundreds of bodies, buried multiple cadavers in the same grave, and crushed caskets to fit them into single plots for years. Many people can’t find their relatives’ graves.

Galilee continued to perform burials after its registration expired. The cemetery was closed in 2014.

Owner Jemar Lambert received 10 years’ probation in a plea deal with prosecutors for his role in the mishandling of burials.