Her father’s remains are missing from a Winnipeg cemetery. Now she’s escalating legal action

A British woman is planning to sue a cemetery company after an empty grave was found where her father’s remains were supposed to be buried in Winnipeg.

A U.K. woman who learned last year that her father’s remains were missing from a Manitoba cemetery is now escalating legal action against the company that managed the cemetery.

Elizabeth Patrick learned in May 2025 that the remains of her father, Sgt. Gordon Alexander Patrick, were not at Green Acres Funeral Home & Cemetery in Winnipeg, where she previously believed they were.

Her father, a Second World War veteran, died in 1973 and she believed he was buried in an unmarked grave in the cemetery.

She was wishing to have her father’s remains disinterred to be reburied with her son in Ontario, who died in 2022. When she started the process, she learned the grave thought to be containing her father’s remains was empty.

The cemetery is managed by Service Corporation International (SCI). Patrick said SCI took over the original company that managed Green Acres during a merger and is responsible for the cemetery now.

She said on Wednesday that SCI recently offered her a $10,000 settlement, a $1,000 charitable donation to an organization of her choice and to pay for a memorial for her father and her son.

Patrick said she’s now working with a Winnipeg lawyer on a lawsuit seeking an undisclosed amount in damages, and said if a resolution isn’t reached, the case will head to court.

“The ideal outcome is that they pay me for quite a bit more than they are offering for the pain and suffering for losing my father, for not giving my father the duty of care that he deserved,” Patrick said.

She said she has also filed a complaint with Manitoba’s Consumer Protection Branch.

CTV News has reached out to SCI and Green Acres Cemetery but has not yet heard back.

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With files from CTV’s Alex Karpa