Here’s what a press release from Warner Brothers/Discovery says about the new series titled “The Mortician” that is scheduled to be premiered on Sunday on HBO:

“THE MORTICIAN chronicles a trusted family-owned funeral home that hid behind a façade of decency and propriety to take advantage of loved ones at their most vulnerable moments. In the early 1980s, David Sconce, scion of the Lamb family, took over the family business and sought to exploit the deceased in numerous ways to expand their earnings. Driven by profit, the Lamb Funeral Home in Pasadena, California engaged in years of morally questionable and inhumane practices.”

Even though I was in business in Minnesota at the time I do not remember this case that happened in Southern California.  I guess you could chalk that up to the actions occuring in the pre-internet days and news, if chronicled on the network television stations did not last there long as news broadcasters had to make room for the next news of the day.  It makes one realize what a different world we live in today when events can be archived for immediate access online.

In any regard, according to the Warner Brothers/Discovery press release that you can read here, the three-part series will be broadcast on three consecutive Sundays — June 1, June 8, and June 15.

Here’s another exerpt from the press release, “The scandal shook Southern California and as members of the Lamb family stood trial, the funeral industry took heed, bringing about tighter regulations and allowing for greater transparency into the business of death.”

David Sconce was originally sentenced to five years in prison for his part in the dealings of the Lamb Funeral Home.

One of the articles that I read about the Lamb Funeral Home is that it documented 194 death calls and only a couple of years later it documented 8,173 death calls.

Related Article — A Mortuary tangled in the macabre.  Los Angeles Times – publish date – 1988

Related Article — Convicted mortician David Sconce defends his criminal mass cremations, “doesn’t put any value” in the deceased.  People Magazine publish date – May 19, 2025

Related — Book about the case.  “A Family Business” available from Amazon.

Tom Anderson
Funeral Director Daily

Funeral Director Daily take:  In one of the articles I read a lady makes this comment, “Trust is foundational for funeral directors.  The unfortunate reality is, like any other occupation, there are some bad apples.”

That comment is true. . . and unfortunate.  I know hundreds, maybe thousands, of great compassionate funeral directors who do everything they can to make a family’s circumstances easier.  They give of themselves, take time away from their own families, make financial sacrifices for those they serve and yet. . . the bad apples make giving the profession a great name difficult.

There is no doubt, as hard as we work to uplift the profession. . .the “hits” just keep on coming to us by those we originally know as colleagues.  I’m guessing that if this series gets any traction at all we will once again hear negative things about our chosen profession.

On watching the series:  Angie and I are in the process of weaning ourselves from cable tv to full streaming options.  However, because of the bandwidth issues that sometimes occur in rural America we continue to have Spectrum cable tv at our Minnesota home, along with some streaming options.

We don’t purchase HBO streaming but in a search found out the series will run concurrently on Max.  As a perk of our Spectrum cable Max is one of the free streaming channels that we receive.  I’m not sure what other streaming services will carry the programming, but you can click here to see the information and a trailer from the Max website.

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