Tiffany Mantzouridis had a hunch that something was off with her employer, Patrick Vereb, owner of Vereb Funeral Home and Eternity Pet Memorials.
“He would throw away crematory tags and keep handwritten notes of where which pets should go, but he never could name the crematory he was using for the smaller pets or the cemetery,” said Mantzouridis, who worked as an intern at the funeral home. “Whenever anyone questioned him, he found an excuse or made you feel dumb.
“When I pulled up official crematory records, there were no pets in the zero- to 30-pound range. It was a kick in the chest.”
Mantzouridis of Irwin kept digital receipts — more than 100 photos of unrefrigerated pets, tossed tags and hand-scribbled notes — and took her concerns to Harrison and Allegheny County police before the reports were escalated to the state in August.
Vereb, 70, of Hazelwood was charged Monday by the state Attorney General’s Office with taking money for pet cremations but instead disposing of the animals in landfills.
He also is accused of giving customers ashes that weren’t from their pets, according to authorities.
Vereb had been scheduled for a preliminary hearing May 9 but waived the charges to court Thursday. His formal arraignment is scheduled for 2 p.m. June 18 at the Allegheny County Courthouse.
An attempt to reach Louis W. Emmi, who is listed as Vereb’s attorney in court documents, was unsuccessful.
Authorities allege that Vereb stole about $660,000 from customers who paid for pet cremations, burials, returns of ashes and other services from 2021 to 2024.
It’s not Vereb’s first brush with the law.
He was sentenced to 30 months in federal prison in 1992 for Medicare and Medicaid fraud, according to the New Castle News.
Vereb owned a funeral home and ambulance service in New Castle at the time.
He was charged with filing at least 20 false claims, worth $125,000. He submitted reimbursements for taking people to doctor’s appointments when, in reality, his service had dropped them off at restaurants or elsewhere.
Similar charges were filed in Dauphin County, where he is accused of filing for services not rendered.
Mantzouridis interned at Vereb’s Harrison funeral home for only seven months, but what she uncovered will stay with her forever, she said.
“There were pets that weren’t refrigerated, and he would make gross comments about them,” she said. “I keep having flashbacks, and I just cry.”
Dead animals were stored in Vereb’s Pittsburgh facility in a garage with no heat or air conditioning, she said.
“Instead of using the freezers to preserve the pets, he would (lay) them on top of the freezers and old embalming tables until he was ready to transport them elsewhere,” she said. “Employees complained of flies, fleas and unpleasant odors coming from the deceased pets while being forced to work in these conditions.”
Mantzouridis quit the day she discovered there was no paper trail for small pets. She said she feared that meant Vereb was giving leftover ashes from large pets to families who paid for their small animals to be cremated.
Vereb was accepting pets for service up until Sunday, she said.
“I complained, and no one listened,” she said. “I had to push. I have to hold up the standards of my license. How long would it have went on?”