By The River

One of the more bizarre and disturbing stories to come out of my hometown of Holland, Michigan, in recent years had to do with a lost corpse. It is a story with elements of black humor, but which ultimately shocks the conscience.

Here's what happened: Erwin Jordan, 66, an average working man, but descended from Holland's original Dutch settlers, dies Dec. 20, 2005. What with the holidays and all, his children can't decide whether to bury or cremate him. The body is at the Notier-Ver Lee-Langeland Funeral Home in Holland. The funeral home, which has been there forever (my grandfather was buried from it), put the corpse in a black body bag inside a white cardboard cremation box to await their decision. Since its refrigeration units are all in use, they put the box in the unheated funeral home garage (Big Mistake #1)

After the holidays, the kids, who seem a bit dysfunctional, still can't decide. One day, Jan. 6, 2006, to be exact, along comes a truck from Priority Arrowaste, the regular trash hauler used by the funeral home. The dim-bulb crew sees the white box, which weighed 70 pounds, and according to testimony in the lawsuit, thinks it contains used rags (Big Mistake #2). A worker picks up the box to put it in the truck. It breaks, and the body bag tumbles out. He picks it up--that must have been easy--and throws it in a dumpster (Big Mistake #3), which is then emptied into the truck.

Off goes the truck to the Auburn Hills Landfill (did it used to be a subdivision?) operated by Waste Management, Inc., in Zeeland Twp. Erwin Jordan's body is dumped in the landfill along with whatever else is in the truck (Big Mistake #4). Seventy other truckloads of garbage are dumped on top of him before the mistake is discovered later that day. The police go to the landfill with cadaver dogs on Jan. 7-8, 2006, but can't find the body.

Now things really get strange. The search never resumes. Police determine that no crime has been committed, so they have no obligation to find the body. The Michigan Department of Environmental Quality, after initially insisting that the body must be found and removed from the landfill, change their mind. They determine that it is only against the law to dump medical waste in a landfill, i.e., body parts. Since Jordan's body is intact, voila! No law has been violated! The Jordan kids say they don't want the search to continue, either. Only Jordan's brother, Stuart, issues a plaintive plea to find his brother Erwin. The Holland Sentinel publishes an editorial headlined "Find the Body."

Guess what? Erwin Jordan is still in the landfill. This was no Law & Order landfill search, where they keep digging till they find the body (that does happen in real life, by the way, usually when someone offed in New York is suspected to be in a landfill in Pennsylvania). A county judge should have ordered the search to continue, and hang the cost. That's what insurance is for. Inconvenience to business or bureaucrats is not a legitimate excuse. Where were Holland's many pro-life clergy? The whole episode shocks the conscience.

This past Friday, the various parties squared off in a Michigan courtroom for the opening rounds of the litigation. Notier-VerLee-Langeland and Priority Arrowaste, which appears to be the hardliner against settlement, are suing each other. The Jordan family, now united, is suing both. Where is the Pedro Almodovar of America to turn this epic into the absurdist film it cries out to be?