A Q&A session between Green Acres Memorial Park clients and state officials expected this week has been delayed.

Pamela Weaver, spokesman for Secretary of State Delbert Hosemann, said plans for a Wednesday meeting have been put on hold while the division of Business Regulation and Enforcement gathers more information. She said an informal session with people who have purchased grave spaces in the private cemetery, some of whom have also prepaid for burial merchandise and services, remains a possibility.

“I can’t really say for sure right now,” Weaver said. “We’re trying to get more information for the public.”

Court documents filed in January culminated a state inquiry that found more than $370,000 missing from a pre-need trust account. State law mandates 85 percent of pre-paid services for grave markers, vaults and other cemetery merchandise be deposited into the account.

Green Acres’ license to sell pre-need services was revoked by court order Feb. 12. The state has also sought to have power over the account, currently held by Houston-based Mike Graham and Associates, replaced with local cemetery officials or someone designated by the Secretary of State’s Office. Representatives of the company have not appeared in court or answered media inquiries.

Court holds have been placed on business and trust accounts held by the company in Mississippi, including Vicksburg, and in Florida. One is the cemetery’s perpetual care fund, set up to handle money to pay for continuing maintenance, which the division chief has testified in court is short $13,000 since the initial complaint against Green Acres was filed Jan. 23.

Burials continue at the 15-acre cemetery on U.S. 80 despite the investigation, but the situation has left local funeral directors no choice but to ask those with funeral plans to pay for pre-need services a second time. All Vicksburg funeral homes have used the cemetery when requested by locals, but hold none of them has an ownership role.

The cemetery was established in 1955 and wasoperated by Joe Varner for 30 years until his death in 1989. After a succession of operators, it was purchased by Graham in 2001. A number of liens and personal lawsuits had been filed against the company in the years leading up to the current probe, according to Warren County Chancery Court records.

Seven additional funeral industry firms in Mississippi were targeted for action by Hosemann’s office in the sweep. Corporate reporting violations alleged at Green Acres were the most serious individual case, in terms of the total of missing money.

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Contact Danny Barrett Jr. at dbarrett@vicksburgpost.com