Restitution; MCL 780.766(4)(f); People v Garrison; Statutory interpretation; Alken-Ziegler, Inc v Hague; “Actual”; “Interment”; In re White

The court held that an engraved granite bench and its installation at the victim’s gravesite qualified as “the cost of actual funeral and related services” under MCL 780.766(4)(f), so it was not erroneous to include that cost in restitution. Defendant pled nolo contendere to second-degree murder and felony-firearm, and the restitution request included invoices for a memorial bench described as “interment costs.” On appeal, defendant argued the bench was “outside [of] funeral expenses” and not authorized because there was “no proof” it was part of the funeral itself. The court rejected that framing, explaining defendant “misreads the statutory language” by treating it as limited to the funeral service itself, where the statute authorizes “the cost of actual funeral and related services.” It reasoned that “funeral” modifies “services,” and that “interment” concerns “the act or ceremony of interring,” i.e., burial as a component of or immediately following a funeral, making it “a service related to actual funeral services.” It also emphasized there is “nothing in the language of MCL 780.766(4)(f)” requiring the bench to have been completed or installed before the ceremony, and nothing supporting the “yearly memorial services in perpetuity” slippery-slope argument. Relying on the Supreme Court’s interpretation that “full restitution” is “maximal and complete,” the court concluded the trial court did not err in finding the bench-and-installation costs were actual costs of services related to the funeral. Affirmed.