Investigators end search near vacant Anson Co. funeral home

ANSON COUNTY — Investigators have wrapped up a 30-acre search in Anson County, using heavy equipment to scour a field looking for human remains. They spent hours working at the site in Lilesville on Saturday, just 6 miles from the funeral home in Wadesboro.

The land belongs to the family of Mary McLendon. On Wednesday she was sentenced for failing to cremate bodies after taking funeral money from families. During that sentencing she confessed that one body was still in the now vacant funeral home. Investigators found two decomposed bodies there. Then they started searching the family property for more.

"I seen…a black dog," neighbor Dominque Burns said. "I seen a lot of tools. I seen digging and a machine to dig."

Investigators told Channel 9 they didn't find any corpses on the land, a relief to neighbors who watched the search.

"It's a relief period for the whole situation," Angela Burns said.

Burns told us she knows McLendon and she was surprised by the accusations.

"I know Mary and she buried my husband's mother," Burns said. "And she's always been nice to us so it's a confusing situation."

Other people in the area are just plain shocked.

"It's strange," Jim Alexander said. "It is strange. You don't hear about it very often."

WSOC