My Wife Of 5 Years Passed Away. Now Her Ex Is Claiming Her Body.

I am in Texas. I have a signed, sealed, certified and filed marriage certificate to my wife. we’ve been together for over 6 years.

she passed away Sunday morning and when the funeral home went to bring her back, a judge put a stop to it because her ex husband laid claim as well.

after a long day of trying to figure things out, it turns out that my wife may have never finalized the divorce from her ex. the petition was filed. it went thru court. and then after sometime it was dismissed.

i can prove 100% that for the past six years my wife has had zero communication with him. he couldn’t even tell the ME her hair color, her weight nor the color of “his wife’s“ wedding ring. we have a daughter together as well.

if he is able to claim her tomorrow, I’ve been made aware I will not be informed of any of the service or anything.

do I have any options? I just found this info out at 445 this afternoon that’s why I have not tried reaching out to lawyers yet.

location: Texas. near Houston.

**edited to add since a lot of comments are towards it - I do not care about any inheritance, life insurance policies or anything like that. I even told her mother and her ex I’d sign any paperwork they wanted me to that’s geared towards that. All I want is my wife so I can lay her to rest surrounded by the people that have been her family the past six years.

Six years ago I met her while she was in the middle of a criminal case against this specific ex. She walked away from him, filed the divorce (never finalized it unbeknownst to me until today) and cut ties with him and all of her family. They’ve literally had zero contact with her in over 5 years. Had I not searched through Facebook and found her dad to tell him about his daughter, they literally would have never known. Or they wouldn’t have known until it was already much much later.