Cantrell Funeral Home first opened in 1955 when owner Raymond Cantrell Sr. opened his first funeral home at the corner of Kercheval and Montclair on Detroit’s east side. The funeral home was an immediate success for Cantrell and he soon needed a larger building. In 1964, he finally moved Cantrell Funeral Home to the same location that you not only see in the video but also where all of this tragedy took place, which was 10400 Mack Ave again on Detroit’s east side. Unfortunately, Raymond Cantrell Sr. passed away in 2016 and his son Raymond Cantrell II took over the funeral home. Raymond Cantrell Sr. owned and operated the legendary Cantrell Funeral Home for over 60 years at the time of his death.
Both before his death and since his death in 2016, the funeral home was continuously plagued by “jaw-dropping” violations. Over the years, violations continued to pile up against Cantrell Funeral Home and prompted visits from state investigations many times from the 1990’s through its final closure in 2018. Finally in 2018, the State Department of Licensing and Regulatory Affairs suspended the funeral home license of Cantrell Funeral Home after they investigated allegations made against the funeral home. They suspended their license based on incompetence, gross negligence, and improperly stored bodies. During that same investigation, officials also uncovered almost 300 containers of cremated remains in the basement, and at this point still unaware of the other dark secrets still lurking inside.
Later in 2018, state investigators again returned to Cantrell Funeral Home after an anonymous phone call led them to where they could find numerous corpses hidden throughout the funeral home. Investigators ended up finding a still-born infant corpse hidden in a box. Upon further investigation and another search, they found 11 more bodies of deceased infants, ranging from gestation up to only a couple of months old - and some of them even appeared to have been mummified. This discovery proved to be the final “nail in the coffin” as the State of Michigan revoked all licensing for the owners of Cantrell Funeral Home and it was immediately shut down.
In 2019, shortly after the terrifying gruesome discoveries forced the funeral home to immediately close, a major transformation took place inside the old Cantrell Funeral Home as the new owner is turning the space into a community center, a much-needed resource for people in the crime-ridden neighborhood on Detroit’s east side. As of 2022, the former Cantrell Funeral Home is still undergoing renovations to convert it into a community center.