MIAMI – Following a key ruling from a federal judge against it, Celebrity Cruises has settled a lawsuit filed after the morgue on one of its ships malfunctioned and kept a family from having an open-casket funeral.

Judge Kathleen Williams ruled July 8 to deny the motion for summary judgment of Celebrity Cruises, whose staff had to move the body of Robert Jones in August 2022 from the morgue of the Celebrity Equinox to an ice-carving freezer. With a trial on the horizon, the parties announced three days later they had reached a confidential settlement.

Jones suffered a cardiac after the ship set sail from Fort Lauderdale and traveled the Caribbean Sea. He was traveling with his wife Marilyn, their children and their grandchildren.