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Grieving Family Horrified As Strange Woman Standing Over Casket Gets Her ‘Revenge’

Tabatha Lynch, an insurance adjuster from Tulsa, passed away from natural causes at age 38. She left behind her four children, ages 4 to 18, a brother, nephews, nieces. In short, a whole family of people that loved and supported her throughout her life.

Tabatha’s family was doing their best to come to terms with her untimely death, but had no idea they were about to become embroiled in something that none of them had ever anticipated. It began when a strange woman showed up at the wake…

Tabatha’s immediate family had shown up to the funeral home earlier than the crowd in order to pay their respects in private. Before they could enter the viewing area, however, they noticed a woman that none of them had ever seen before, standing next to the casket. She told the family that she was there to help…
The strange woman explained that she was a skilled makeup artist who had been retained by the funeral home to put a few last-minute touches on the deceased. She said how sorry she was for their loss and asked them to step out of the room for a few minutes so that she could finish her work. When they returned, she was gone.
A few minutes later, Funeral director Robert Gardner heard a scream erupt from inside Tabatha’s viewing room. He assumed, as one does when one owns a funeral home, that the scream was not one of panic but of grief. It wasn’t until two girls came running into his office with horrified looks on their faces that he knew something was actually wrong…
The girls told Mr. Gardner that someone, likely the “makeup artist” they had seen in the room earlier, had pulled a glob of hair from Tabatha Lynch’s head and dropped it on the floor in front of the casket. They also noted that the makeup on Tabatha’s face has been smeared and as if that weren’t enough, the body had been even further desecrated.
Tabatha’s mother, Charlotte Wheeler, came in next and told Mr. Gardner that the stranger had also slashed her daughter’s face from the top of her hairline to the tip of her nose. “She had makeup and lipstick smeared all over her face; her hair was just all over the place,” she explained. The police were soon called…

The police arrived and found the same things as the family, the cut, the hair upon the floor, but no other clues as to who the mysterious makeup artist could be. It wasn’t until sometime later, when the funeral parlor staff took Tabatha into the back to fix her up that they found out the true extent of the woman’s desecrations.

The vile woman had not only altered Tabatha’s visage, but had apparently also cut off her breasts, and a toe as well. As if all that weren’t enough, she’d even stolen her shoes. The missing body parts were nowhere to be found.
Following procedure, the police headed to Tabatha Lynch’s apartment to investigate and ended up running into the very same “makeup artist” who had her hands in the casket. Apparently her desecration of the dearly departed was not enough, she had to break into Tabatha’s apartment and take a few keepsakes for the road.
Police patted the woman down and found a folding knife which contained hair matching Tabatha’s. She also had a pair of scissors, a box cutter, and several cosmetics. A little background check into the culprit and they finally had a name: Shayna Lauren Sims of Miami.

But why had she done it? Apparently, she believed that her husband had cheated on her with Tabatha Lynch and she wanted retribution which Tabatha had, up til now, refused. The two women were known as “Frenemies” and were often in competition with one another.

Sims’ defense attorney was hoping that their client’s history of bipolar disorder and schizophrenia might help make it possible for an insanity plea. Unfortunately, neither the doctors nor the judge were convinced. After being examined by a forensic psychologist, Sims was found mentally competent and the trial could proceed as planned…

Sims had a number of charges against her including: larceny and knowingly concealing stolen property (for stealing the shoes), first-degree burglary (for deceiving Lynch’s son in order to enter their apartment, unauthorized dissection, and unlawful removal of body parts from a corpse. She of course pleaded not guilty on all counts.

The prosecution was backed slightly by the fact that Ms. Sims had another case pending against her at the time of her arrest. Two weeks before Sims pled guilty to an assault and battery charge where she was caught on tape aggressively bumping into a woman she’d been stalking and harassing for months. That woman was Christina Perez, who apparently dated Sims’ husband five years prior…

In early June, Sims was released on bond on the condition that she not enter Tulsa County except for medical appointments and emergencies. Sims violated this agreement four days after her release when she returned to the apartment where Lynch’s children live.

The Tulsa World reported that Sims had been “trying to obtain a cell phone from a pop-up phone stand in the apartment complex when the complex manager and two other women recognized her and noticed her GPS ankle monitor.” A motion to revoke her bond also alleges that Sims was wearing a wig in an effort to disguise herself. Unsurprisingly, the motion was granted and Sims has been in custody ever since.