Unveiled: The Dark Secret the Director of ‘The Mortician’ Hid From HBO’s Chilling Series on History’s Most Sinister Undertaker
Ever wonder how far someone might go to turn a family funeral business into a grotesque money-making machine? HBO’s new docuseries, The Mortician, dives headfirst into the chilling saga of David Sconce — a man whose profit-driven horrors included mass cremations, stolen jewelry from corpses, and even hiring hitmen. But nothing quite rattled the director like the grim discovery of a baby’s corpse hidden beneath a blanket in cold storage — a tragedy so dark it didn’t make the cut. This saga isn’t just another true crime tale; it’s a raw look at human depravity, the price of greed, and the haunting reality behind the mortuary doors. Buckle up — this is one story that’ll have you questioning just how you want your final goodbye handled. LEARN MORE.
RadarOnline.com can report how the horrifying HBO series was based on the true story of a famous cremator who went to prison for “mishandling human remains” for many years.
After his professional football dreams were ripped away due to a torn ligament, he decided to run the family business – basically into the ground.
Motivated by his desire to maximize profits to help the business grow, Sconce incinerated multiple bodies in the same chamber.
Due to his disturbing actions, the deceased’s family members ended up with not only the cremains of their loved one but several different people as well.
In addition to cremating multiple bodies at once, Sconce was also accused of stealing and selling corpses’ gold jewelry and dental fillings, hiring hitmen to attack business rivals and mutilating corpses.
The former funeral boss, now 68, attempted to justify his disturbing decisions and explain his business approach.
Sconce said: “I don’t put any value on anybody after they’re gone and dead. As they shouldn’t when I’m gone and dead. Love ’em when they’re here.
“I could cremate one guy in two hours, or you could put 10 of them in there and take two and a half hours. So what would be the difference? There is none.”
The chilling case from many decades ago included many horrors and disturbing events, some that weren’t even able to be included in the series.
One sickening incident came from Louis Quinones, who used to drive a van that retrieved the dead bodies to be cremated at Sconce’s mortuary.
He recalled how one day he was in a cold storage room where the mortuary kept bodies on shelves, and he kicked a blanket on the floor aside, not expecting anything to be underneath.
After Quinones felt something under the blanket, he lifted it up to find the corpse of a baby.
After reading the baby’s tag on its ankle, he learned he had delivered what was believed to be the infant’s ashes weeks earlier to the child’s mother after she had paid for a cremation.
Rofé said: “That is another level of depravity.”
A few years later, he was released in 1991 after serving two and a half years.
Sconce was then sentenced to 25 years to life in 2013 after violating the lifetime probation after he was convicted of having a stolen firearm.
In 2023, he was released on parole.
