Mortician with a badge

• Posted By: Marc Martin
• Posted On: 4:34 p.m. | December 22, 2011

Briefcase in hand, Steve Allen knocks on the back door of Rose Mortuary and Crematory. He’s been on the road for two hours, and it’s a little before 9; the late-autumn sun paints the distant cliffs of Mt. San Jacinto yellow and gold.

Manager Thomas Moen is surprised by the visit. He glances about to make sure that the consumer guide and price lists are displayed as required by law.

“How ya doing?” Allen’s voice projects a robust exuberance.

“Fit as a fiddle…,” says Moen without missing a cue.

“… and happy as a lark,” says Allen, completing Moen’s signature response.

They have known each other for almost eight years, and beneath the surface of their friendliness is a familiar tension. If the state’s funeral industry had police officers, Allen, 55, would be one.

He is a field representative for the state’s Cemetery and Funeral Bureau — a “mortician with a badge,” as he’s heard himself described — and is here to inspect the embalming and storage room and look at the price sheets.

Moen shares how busy the mortuary’s been, and Allen scans the room. He notices a framed newspaper article from 2009 when the funeral home invited visitors to sign memorial books for Michael Jackson, Ed McMahon and Farrah Fawcett.

Read Thomas Curwen’s full story: “A mortician with a badge.”