Monday, Jun. 22, 1981

THE RIP VAN WINKLE WRINKLE

Cryonics Interment Inc. of Los Angeles, Calif., was one of several firms spawned by the 1960s vogue for freezing human bodies until the cures for various diseases were found, at which time the bodies would be thawed and presumably revived. When Cryonics Interment went broke after five years, however, the supply of freezing liquid nitrogen was cut off and the eight or so bodies in the company's burial capsules thawed and decomposed. The relatives of three of the deceased--who had paid a total of $31,294 to have their loved ones preserved--sued Cryonics Executive Robert Nelson and Mortician Joseph Klockgether. Nelson who runs a TV repair business, insisted that customers realized he was engaged in nonprofit research and made no guarantees. The jury was unconvinced, and awarded the relatives a cool $928,594. In Berkeley, Calif., President Arthur Quaife of Trans Time Inc., who claims that his is the nation's only surviving cryonic suspension firm (ten patients on ice), said that cryonics still has a "great future."

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