Judge rules no lawsuits by families can interfere with receiver in Galilee cemetery case

March 28--NASHVILLE -- A Nashville judge on Friday ordered lawyers for scores of families with loved ones buried at Galilee Memorial Gardens to not interfere with the state-appointed receiver working to determine where -- one lawyer said in court -- potentially up 10,000 to 12,000 bodies are buried.

Memphis attorney Howard Manis, who represents about 150 plaintiffs in one of two lawsuits filed by families, told Davidson County Chancellor Carol McCoy in a motion hearing that the "magnitude of the situation is enormous" because of the way Galilee's owners did business. He estimated that between 1,000 and 2,000 bodies were interred at the Bartlett cemetery since it lost its state license in January 2011 and potentially 10,000 to 12,000 are there overall.

"We just don't know yet," Manis said.

Manis said several funeral services would be conducted on Saturdays and Sundays, with families lined up down Ellis Road, ushered in for brief services under blue tents where caskets sat on rails with no graves dug beneath them, and then escorted off the property to make room for the next service and told their loved ones would be buried elsewhere on the grounds after they left.

"About 95 percent of our class (of plaintiffs) told us that same story when we interviewed them," the attorney said.

The motion hearing was to settle various attempts to intervene in the case. McCoy ruled that while the lawsuits may continue, there can be no interference with the work of former U.S. Attorney David Kustoff, who was appointed by the state commissioner of commerce and insurance as receiver in the state's takeover of the cemetery.

Kustoff is sifting through records of the cemetery and its associated businesses to try to muster its finances and determine who is buried where. Previous court filings have indicated multiple bodies are buried in single graves, without certainty of identities.

Kustoff filed his first report with the Nashville court this week, which said both the office and records at Galilee were unorganized and in disarray.

Eleven attorneys were up front in McCoy's courtroom, representing the two different sets of plaintiffs, the defendants and the state. She said the attorneys are free to take depositions and keep their lawsuits for civil damages alive but "you can make no request that interferes, directly or indirectly, with the duties of the receiver or the commissioner. The state is acting on behalf of all the families. Mr. Kustoff has a duty to help ease the stress of the plaintiffs. There are a lot of families who want resolution of this, but it's going to take a while."

She encouraged the attorneys to share information with Kustoff but warned that he many not be able to share with them all information he discovers immediately.

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