Crime & Law
City of Chicago Suing South Chicago Chapel Where Dozens of Decomposing Bodies Found
Chicago police investigate South Chicago Chapel after authorities discovered dozens of decomposing bodies in the funeral home's basement on Thursday, Aug. 6, 2026. (Tyler Pasciak LaRiviere / Chicago Sun-Times via AP)
The city of Chicago is suing the owners of the South Chicago Chapel, weeks after dozens of improperly stored, decomposing bodies were discovered at the facility in what city attorneys claim was an “immensely unsanitary” situation.
The city filed its lawsuit in Cook County Circuit Court last week against owners Johanna and Clark Morgan, alleging their “unlicensed funeral home” violated the city’s municipal code numerous times through dangerous, hazardous and unsanitary conditions.
The Cook County Medical Examiner’s Office and Chicago Police Department launched investigations in early August after 56 decomposing bodies were found inside the Southeast Side facility.
According to the lawsuit, 51 bodies were discovered stacked in a rear storage room in “varying degrees of severe decay/decomposition.” Half of those were found inside an “insufficiently operating cooler,” the lawsuit states, while the others were “strewn haphazardly” throughout this storage area in an “advanced state of decomposition.”
“The stench was overwhelming and could be smelled outside the building,” the complaint states, adding that there were swarms of flies and numerous rats discovered around the bodies. “This was an immensely unsanitary situation.”
Through the suit, the city is asking the court to issue a daily fine of $11,500 until the violations are remedied, as well as temporary and permanent injunctions to correct the flagged issues.
State business records show Johanna Morgan incorporated South Chicago Chapel Inc. in 2022 and her funeral director’s license was temporarily suspended last month.
Illinois Comptroller Susana Mendoza said earlier this month she was already familiar with the Morgans and their “egregious past practices” when her office shut down their other business, the Heights Crematory in Chicago Heights, after the discovery of several improperly stored bodies which had been “stacked on top of each other, not refrigerated and partially exposed.”
The Medical Examiner’s office is still working to identify the remainder of the bodies discovered at the South Chicago Chapel.
The Morgans have not been charged criminally, though an Illinois State Police spokesperson said an investigation of the conduct at Heights Crematory is ongoing after Cook County State’s Attorney Eileen O’Neill Burke initially declined to bring charges in the case.
The Chicago Police Department said it is conducting an independent investigation regarding the Morgans’ handling of bodies at South Chicago Chapel.
Capitol News Illinois contributed to this report.
