Columbia, TN — A Tennessee woman was arrested last week after she allegedly tried to take a body out of a casket during a funeral service.
Cynthia Ann Frierson, 36, was arrested after her red pickup truck allegedly sideswiped two cars parked in front of a row of houses, according to the Columbia Daily Herald.
While police officers were responding to one of those accidents, they were called about Frierson causing a problem at Roundtree-Napier-Ogilvie Funeral Home.
“Frierson showed up at the funeral home as they were actively having a funeral and walked up to the open casket,” a witness told officers according to the police report. She allegedly “then began grabbing at the body inside of the casket and at one point attempted to get the body out of the casket.”
After she refused to leave, six people pulled her away from the casket and took her outside the funeral home, the witness told police.
When officers arrived, Frierson smelled of alcohol and had slurred speech. She told police that she had not driven to the funeral home, but did say she drove a friend to the store in a red truck before she changed her story and said the friend drove the vehicle instead.
Once the officers arrived at the police station, one noticed that Frierson was holding a piece of toilet paper and a lighter,according to the Daily Herald.
“While Frierson was speaking with booking staff, I looked into (her) right pocket to see what she had in the toilet paper, and I could see a clear glass pipe inside of the paper, so I grabbed it out of Frierson’s pocket,” Officer Landen Barber wrote in the report.
Frierson was charged with disrupting a funeral or memorial service, public intoxication, driving on a revoked/suspended license, immediate notice of an accident and unlawful drug paraphernalia and was held on a $6,500 bond.
