Dying alone: the unclaimed bodies of Sault Ste. Marie

Seven people in Sault Ste. Marie died over the past two years with no family or friends to lay them to rest.  

Municipalities in Ontario are bound by the province's Anatomy Act to provide services for bodies that go unclaimed.

According to the act, an unclaimed body is defined as the body of a deceased person that is unclaimed by a relative or friend within 24 hours after the death and won’t be used for organ or tissue donations.    

Social Services Sault Ste. Marie District manager Sherry Lacasse says the Office of the Chief Coroner engages in its own process of due diligence — reaching out to social services, police and a number of community and government services and agencies — in an effort to identify next of kin when someone dies.

When those efforts fail, the body goes back to the municipality in order to be buried.  

“The older you get, unfortunately, you lose touch with family and your circle sometimes becomes smaller and smaller — and sometimes, depending on your age and your situation, you might not have gotten married or had a spouse, or had children,” Lacasse told SooToday during a telephone interview last week.  

The remains of four people went unclaimed in 2022, with another three bodies going unclaimed the previous year. 

Lacasse says in two of those cases family members were identified, but they refused to claim the bodies.    

“There were actual family members, but unfortunately there might have been a breakdown in the relationship and they didn’t want to be involved — so then it still is classified, unfortunately, as unclaimed,” she said. 

When a body goes unclaimed in Ontario, municipalities are given a form known as a Warrant to Bury the Body of a Deceased Person in order to proceed with the burial.

Lacasse says bodies are buried, not cremated, “just in case something should happen down the road.” Social services works with all funeral homes in Sault Ste. Marie, on a rotating basis, to provide funeral arrangements and bury the bodies.  

Lacasse says social services usually provides around $2,600 to cover a casket, funeral plot and funeral arrangements for each unclaimed body through a “low-income rate” that's been worked out with local funeral homes.    

“We have some case managers at the office who assist people in gaining employment and helping with homelessness and helping with child care — and then we have two workers that, part of their role is working with the funeral homes and assisting with the funeral arrangements, and talking to the coroners about the paperwork, talking to the city about the plot,” Lacasse said. 

Lacasse adds that It’s not uncommon for the same social services staffers to attend funerals for those whose remains have gone unclaimed in order to “have somebody there."

“At least we can be there, because unfortunately, they don’t have anybody else,” she said.

Social services doesn't have any information on unclaimed bodies beyond the past two years, according to Lacasse.