Family Lived With Corpse, Prayed for Resurrection

"There clearly was an over-exuberance of one's faith" in a Canadian woman who lived with her husband's corpse for six months while she and five of their children prayed for his resurrection, a court heard this week. Kaling Wald's husband, Peter, is believed to have died in March last year, but the 52-year-old's decomposing body remained in a room in their Hamilton, Ontario, home—sealed to prevent the smell getting out—until that September when the sheriff arrived to evict the family for defaulting on their mortgage, the Hamilton Spectator reports. She told investigators that the family and seven adult friends who lived in the home all prayed daily for him to come back to life.

Neighbors tell the CBC that Peter Wald was a deeply religious man who had Christian sayings and symbols on his van and even his clothes. He had diabetes, and authorities believe he died of natural causes. His wife was initially charged with neglect of duty regarding a dead body and offering an indignity to a body, but that was reduced to a single charge of failing to notify police or the coroner of the death; prosecutors agreed there was no ill intent. On Monday, she was given a suspended sentence and told to get counseling. Her lawyer tells Reuters that his client now understands the law, is remorseful, and after court proceedings, has finally felt able to properly grieve for her husband. (In Detroit last year, two brothers hoping for resurrection allegedly stole their 92-year-old father's body from a cemetery.)