Asheboro, NC -- Dealing with the death of a child is hard enough, but a delayed headstone has made it even more difficult for an Asheboro woman.

Rosa Cervantes buried her son, Ethan, two years ago without a headstone.

The company said it needed to be paid in full first. But Cervantes said she's paid more than the cost of the headstone already, and she gave News 2 a copy of the contract and her receipts to prove it.

"You want the best for your children...and you can't get it, they're gone. His headstone has to be perfect. He's my child. He's the baby. Ya know? So I got what I thought would be the best thing," said Cervantes.

Cervantes said, when her son died, she ordered his headstone from Coggins Marble and Granite Co. in Asheboro for $7,500.

She said every time she called the company to ask where it was, they told her she owed more money.

Eventually she had paid more than $15,000 and Ethan's grave was still covered with nothing but grass.

"I had to tell her, this is what they do to everybody, it's not just you. It's customer, after customer, after customer. If they pay in full, and they pay the right price, they don't get it for a year or two down the road, even though they paid in full," said Tanya Ching, a former employee at Coggins Marble and Granite Co.

Ching worked for the company for two years. She said at one point, every customer she dealt with was upset. But the owners told her to make excuses.

"One of the mottos I got when I first started working, which should have threw up a red flag to me was, when customers lost somebody and they're grieving, this stone is the last thing they can do for them, so you can kind of milk them for any penny they got because they're weak," said Ching.

Late Tuesday night, News 2 received a statement from Justin Coggins.

"Upon recently returning to work I have found issues in need of my full attention. We are making positive changes to fully satisfy issues of any and all complaints including some staff changes. At this time I have made an attempt to meet Ms. Cervantes in which she has refused and asked for a discount because she now is in need of money. Per her request she asked the monument be install on Friday. We agreed..." he said.

Officials at the Better Business Bureau told News 2 there have been 22 complaints filed against the business in the last three years.

While ten of them were closed this year, some are still unresolved.

 

WFMY News 2