A shipping service did the unthinkable and lost a package that was so valuable that no amount of money (especially not $135) could fix it: a person’s ashes.
Tangenika Lee, from Metro Atlanta, Georgia, USA, said she shipped her 15-year-old son’s ashes from a local United Parcel Service (UPS) store to a family member, but the package never made it.
WBS-TV Channel 2 located Tangenika in Hiram, Georgia, on Tuesday (January 30), where she said that she was now feeling like she had lost her child, Deontray, all over again.
Deontray died of a fentanyl overdose in 2020 at the age of 15, WBS-TV reported. In early January, Tangenika sent his ashes to her sister, who makes customized cremation urns, in Connecticut, USA.
Tangenika Lee said she shipped her 15-year-old son’s ashes from a local UPS store to a family member, but the package never made it
Image credits: WSB TV Atlanta
Image credits: WSB TV Atlanta
Weeks passed, and the ashes reportedly never arrived to Tangenika’s sister. Deontray’s remains were supposed to be at his aunt’s house by January 10.
The grieving mother reportedly said that UPS’ corporate customer service sent her a bewildering $135 check to compensate her for the loss of her son’s ashes. Unsurprisingly, it is a check Tangenika said she refused to cash.
Tangenika reportedly said she had shipped Deontray’s ashes from the UPS store in Hiram, along with some gifts. She had even informed UPS workers what was in the wooden box.
Deontray died of a fentanyl overdose in 2020 at the age of 15
Image credits: Tangenika S Lee
When the ashes failed to arrive, the disconcerted mom went back to the UPS store to ask what happened. She said the police were also there.
Tangenika recalled: “They went back into the store, and they pulled cameras from January 8th, and they told me that the package had actually left their facility. There was nothing they could do about it. I just lost it, [and I] started crying.”
Tangenika reportedly said the ashes were last tracked to a distribution center in Connecticut. She subsequently said she planned to go there herself to look for her son’s remains.
Image credits: WSB TV Atlanta
She said: “If you ask me, it’s just like a repeating nightmare. I cremated him because I had not seen him in seven whole years.
“So, I cremated him so that he could be right here with me, and we could travel together and do things together – and he ain’t here.”
The grieving mother reportedly said that UPS’ corporate customer service sent her a bewildering $135 check to compensate her for the loss of her son’s ashes
Image credits: WSB TV Atlanta
UPS reached out to WBS-TV and said that “with the time constraints, we had to investigate, [and] we found the content of the package was declared by the customer as ‘clothes.’ UPS does not accept shipments of human remains.”
“We extend our deepest sympathy to the family, and our heartfelt thoughts are with them during this time. Unfortunately, the package was lost.”
UPS’s official website lists “human remains, fetal remains, human body parts, human embryos or components thereof” as prohibited items.
People were divided regarding UPS and Tangenika's responsibility
