Negligence In Identifying Son's Body Did Not Deprive Mother of Free Exercise Rights

In Simkova v. City of Newark, (D NJ, March 31, 2014), a New Jersey federal district court dismissed free exercise and due process claims against the city, police officials, the state medical examiner and others. The court described the facts as follows:

In January 2012, plaintiff Zdenka Simkova ... learned that her son, Michael ... who went missing in 2007 over the Thanksgiving holidays and had never been located—had died years earlier and was buried in a mass grave in Hackensack. She filed a federal lawsuit detailing both the resistance she faced after she reported him missing within days after he failed to show up at her house and the misinformation she received from official sources..... Simkova alleged that the defendants failed to follow proper procedures for the identification and investigation of missing persons—a result, in part, of the municipal defendants’ policies and their failure to train their employees—thereby depriving her of her right to possess her son’s body and to bury him in accordance with her religion.

In rejecting plaintiff's free exercise claim, the court emphasized that plaintiff had not alleged defendants were aware of her religious concerns, or had any idea that their actions might affect her religious practice.