Woman accused of corpse abuse pleads guilty to food stamp fraud

FORT WORTH -- A former funeral home owner faces 20 years in federal prison after pleading guilty Tuesday to one count of food stamp fraud.

Rachel Hardy-Johnson, 35, of Mansfield also faces state charges of abuse of a corpse and theft in an unrelated case involving the now-defunct Johnson Family Mortuary in Fort Worth.

In the federal case, Hardy-Johnson could also be fined $250,000 when she is sentenced in May.

Hardy-Johnson used cashier’s checks to pay $26,000 for a 2006 Hummer and $41,700 for a 2008 Mercedes-Benz in February 2011. That April, she went to the Texas Health and Human Services Commission office in Dallas to sign up for federal assistance, according to a news release from the U.S. attorney’s office.

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