Published on: October 2, 2025, 04:59h.
Updated on: October 1, 2025, 02:14h.
- A funeral home director in Connecticut is charged with misappropriating client prepayments for gambling.
- The accused individual lost his funeral home license earlier this year amid these allegations.
In April, Connecticut State Police formally charged 51-year-old Philip Pietras with a first-degree felony count of larceny through embezzlement. The investigation into his actions has intensified this week, leading to an additional 60 criminal charges.
Before the investigation began, Pietras was the owner of several funeral homes in Vernon, East Windsor, Coventry, and Tolland, including Pietras Family Funeral Homes and Burke-Fortin Funeral Home in Vernon.
From at least 2014 through this year, state prosecutors allege that Pietras misused clients’ funds deposited in anticipation of funeral and burial services to sustain his lifestyle, which frequently involved trips to casinos nationwide.
The arrest warrant indicates that Pietras’ gambling excursions included visits to Foxwoods Resort Casino and Mohegan Sun, Connecticut’s two tribal casinos, as well as trips to Atlantic City where he gambled at the opulent Borgata. He also frequented Harrah’s Atlantic City, MGM Springfield in Massachusetts, and Hard Rock Las Vegas prior to its closure in 2020.
On Wednesday, Superior Court Judge Alyce Alfano granted Pietras’ attorneys’ request to reduce his bail from $800,000 to $200,000. Pietras subsequently posted bail and was released.
In their plea for reduced bail, Pietras’ defense claimed that to the best of their knowledge, no prepaid clients were denied their services.
Misappropriated Prepayments
The investigation into Pietras began when an employee from a third-party firm that helps funeral homes manage their funeral contracts alerted police to potential discrepancies at the Coventry location of Pietras Family Funeral Homes. Such firms, often referred to as preneed providers, collaborate with local funeral homes to offer various services like trust funds, insurance plans, and escrow accounts.
The firm’s employee noticed substantial withdrawals from several accounts associated with Pietras Family Funeral Homes, despite the beneficiaries still being alive. Moreover, multiple checks issued by pre-planners were reported cleared, but the funds never reached the accounts managed by the third party.
Upon questioning by police, the affidavit states that Pietras attributed the financial irregularities to “accounting errors,” improper filing of checks, the COVID-19 pandemic, and the frequency of check deposits.
Authorities have interviewed over 60 clients whose prepaid funeral accounts were affected. The warrant alleges that Pietras likely pilfered funds from more than 100 client accounts.
Gambling Addiction
Investigators believe that Pietras’ thefts were motivated by a serious gambling problem. Data from the Connecticut tribal casinos revealed that Pietras and his wife’s rewards cards showed they lost over $1.2 million between January 2010 and November 2024.
Foxwoods Casino did not disclose detailed information about Pietras’ gambling history, but reported that the couple wagered more than $8 million over the past 14 years.
Both casinos stated that Pietras primarily played slot machines, and he also engaged in online gambling through platforms like DraftKings and FanDuel, the respective iGaming partners of Foxwoods and Mohegan Sun.