After months of waiting for the families of victims, the Environmental Protection Agency has completed the demolition of the building in Penrose where nearly 200 decomposing bodies were found last fall.

The EPA said on Monday that the Return to Nature Funeral Home’s demolition was finished Saturday, four days after the start of the project. The process began after several delays on April 16 with a small ceremony for family members of the 189 bodies found decomposing at the site.

The funeral home’s owners, Carie and Jon Hallford, are facing hundreds of felony charges for their alleged role in leaving the bodies, some of which dated back to 2019, in the building while charging victim’s families for cremation and burial services. Also, the Hallfords recently pleaded not guilty to multiple federal charges relating to the business.

The demolition process involved disinfection of the site and the transfer of building materials via lined trucks to the Otero County landfill. EPA contractors then scraped a thin layer of soil from the site’s footprint.

What happens next to the property is still unknown. Fremont County commissioner Kevin Grantham said at a press conference on April 10 that the county could not move forward on any plans for the site because it was still in private hands.

The EPA has opened a cost recovery and enforcement case to recoup the cost of the demolition.