(EL PASO COUNTY, Colo.) — A preliminary hearing is set and bond reduced for one of the owners of the Return to Nature Funeral Home in Penrose, where nearly 200 bodies were discovered improperly stored back in October.

This comes as Colorado state regulators are recommending licensing for funeral home workers.

On Thursday, Jan. 4, a judge reduced Jon Hallford’s $2 million cash-only bond to $100,000.

“I’m absolutely appalled,” said Crystina Page. “You could see, physically see the tension continue as he kept talking.”

Page lost her son, David Jaxon, on September 29, 2019 in an officer-involved shooting in El Paso County. She had him cremated at the Return to Nature Funeral Home, at least that was what she thought.

“I was carrying human remains for four years. They just weren’t my human’s,” Page said.

Now, she and others are learning Hallford could be let out.

“He poses a flight risk and clearly a threat to the community. I know that he has been arrested prior to this case for firearms violations,” she said.

During the hearing, Hallford’s lawyer said Hallford would be willing to submit to conditions to ensure he could not flee. The judge said with the bond reduction would come stipulations like ankle monitoring and non-contact with the victims and others.

Page said it’s not just the fact that he poses a flight risk, but it’s the emotional toll.

“There’s definitely this cloud over us now of, you know, revictimization again,” Page said.

The state is now recommending more requirements for funeral home operators like graduating from mortuary school, passing a national board exam, serving a one-year apprenticeship and passing a background check. However, those already practicing in the industry would be grandfathered in, which some say is a step in the wrong direction.

“As far as I’m concerned, absolutely awful idea,” Page said. “You know, something like that with grandfathering in, Jon and Carrie [Hallford] still would have been doing the exact same thing… they wouldn’t have changed this situation at all.”

The recommendations will now go to the Colorado General Assembly for review.