Home Crime, Courts, Calamity Undertaker Dumps Partially Cremated Body in Community Reservoir

Undertaker Dumps Partially Cremated Body in Community Reservoir

Workers remove the partially cremated remains of an unidentified man from a water reservoir Monday in Nakhon Ratchasima province.

By Teeranai Charuvastra
Staff Reporter

NAKHON RATCHASIMA — An undertaker dumped a body he’d only partially cremated into a reservoir supplying residential drinking water because he was too tired to carry it further, police in Nakhon Ratchasima province said today.

After incompletely cremating a man’s body, Manas Sribuadaeng, 63, stopped short of the designated burial site because – as he later told police – he just became too tired along the way. So he wrapped the body in a bag and dumped it into the Huay Yang Reservoir.

Local residents discovered the body yesterday and alerted the police, who alerted the media, who initially speculated the deceased was a victim of some gruesome murder. Police later tracked the remains to Manas, an undertaker at a temple two kilometers from the reservoir.

“We investigated the incident and found out that the undertaker dumped it into the water,” said Worawuth Leksunthorn, a local police officer. “We asked him why. He said he failed to cremate the entire body and wanted to bury the rest. But he’s old. He’s almost 70. He didn’t make it to the burial site and threw it in the water.”