The owner of an embattled Chicago tombstone company is now under more fire in a lawsuit filed by members of her own family of stealing assets to fund a lavish lifestyle.
More than 125 families in the Chicago area have claimed they were defrauded by Gast Monuments, which announced its closure this summer after 144 years in business.
Gast Monuments proudly advertised itself as a family business spanning over six generations, but a recent lawsuit filed by Katie Gast's uncle alleges the sixth generation of business, under her leadership, is where things went wrong.
Two Years In An Unmarked Grave
When Bart Gruzalski passed away during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic lockdowns, he died alone.
His brother Phil said it was important Bart wasn’t forgotten. So after his burial at St. Boniface cemetery, Phil immediately ordered a grave marker from Katie Gast, president of Gast Monuments.
“They've been [here] almost as long as my family's been here in Chicago,” Phil Gruzalski said.
But for the next two years, Bart’s grave remained bare. Gruzalski said no grave marker ever arrived, while he only received what he said are excuses from Gast.
“She's very sorry about this, you know, and then she says, ‘as a matter of fact, the monument's on the truck’,” Gruzalski said.
Local
Legal Cases Mount
Gruzalski is among several Gast customers in Lake and Cook counties who have filed a lawsuit against the company over the past year.
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Among the latest is a suit filed by three siblings who ordered a $300,000 mausoleum from the company in 2019. The project has not been started as of 2024.
The suit claims Gast "engaged in a pattern of taking money from grieving families" while spending thousands of dollars traveling the world and "bragging about it" on social media, referring to an Instagram post from Gast.
"12 months of adventures. 83 hours of road trips. 27 flights. 16 states. 26 cities," Gast wrote in her Instagram post, listing Key West and Panama City among the cities traveled to.
Similar accusations are spelled out in a lawsuit filed by Gast’s uncles. That lawsuit accuses Gast, along with her brother and father, of draining company assets to fund personal expenses like her wedding, homes for her and her brother, travel expenses and funding for IFC fitness in Palatine, a business owned by Katie Gast and her then-husband.
The lawsuit claims the trio took out more than $1 million in loans against the business, including a mortgage on their 1900 W. Peterson Ave. location in 2022.
Yet another lawsuit accuses Gast of defaulting on that mortgage after just five months.
The lawsuit also alleges that in the midst of loans and defaults, the company continued "taking customer deposits" while "failing to fulfill customer orders and failing to pay vendors."
"There was no marker there, which is just, you know, sad," Gruzalski told NBC 5 Responds.
Gruzalski eventually cut his losses and opted to order a grave marker from another company. Though he won his court case against Gast several weeks ago, he remains skeptical that he will get his money back from them.
"This is like a disaster, you know, that there's so many people affected, so many people that really got robbed," Gruzalski said.
One attorney representing Gast customers said they fear Gast will file bankruptcy, which could wipe out judgements against her, such as Gruzalski's.
NBC 5 Responds did not hear back from a request for comment for Gast, nor her attorney or uncle's attorney.
Illinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul's office has now received 126 complaints regarding Gast Monuments, though it will not comment on whether it will take legal action against the company.
An investigation into Gast Monuments by the Cook County State's Attorney's Office remains ongoing.
According to Gast's LinkedIn profile, she is now living in Texas and is employed by a national disaster recovery company.
