AUGUSTA – A former Augusta woman who died in February has yet to be buried because of a legal dispute among her seven children over whether an autopsy should be performed.

Leita O. Maxim was 77 when she died in a Las Vegas hospital. The official cause of death, according to court documents, was “ventricular fibrillation, respiratory failure and severe pneumonia.”

But her body has been kept at a Gardiner funeral home because four of her daughters, three of whom live in Maine, are seeking an autopsy over concerns their mother died under suspicious circumstances. Maxim’s two sons and another daughter oppose an autopsy.

On Friday, an attorney for Staples Funeral Home wrote Kennebec County Register of Probate Kathleen Ayers saying the funeral home could no longer store Maxim’s body. The letter said the only way the embalmed body could continue to be stored would be by applying chemicals that could affect autopsy results.

“My client indicates it is no longer safe or healthy to continue storing the body at its facility,” the letter read.

Ayers said this is an unusual case because of the involvement of a court in Nevada and the length of time that has elapsed since Maxim’s death.

Early in the case, Judge of Probate James Mitchell consulted by phone with a probate judge in Nevada who didn’t object to Mitchell ruling on the disposal of the body. Still, despite several hearings and depositions, the dispute is unresolved and Maxim’s body has yet to be buried.

In a court order last Monday, Mitchell set a Sept. 8 deadline for anybody to file evidence refuting the pathologist’s cause of death. “The time that has now passed is troubling,” Mitchell wrote.

Mark Susi, an attorney representing the funeral home, asked the court to order that Maxim’s body be transferred elsewhere by Sept. 15 if the dispute continues.

The four daughters who want an autopsy performed – Susan Quinn of Gardiner, Shirley Rivard of Mount Vernon, Deborah Colfer of Augusta and Cindy Novack of Massachusetts – are concerned that their mother may have died from poisoning or medical malpractice, according to court documents.

The other siblings, Bette Ann Chafkin of Massachusetts, Benjamin K. Maxim of Augusta and William Edgar Maxim Jr. of California, oppose an autopsy.

Donald Gasink, a Maine attorney representing William Edgar Maxim Jr., said his client simply wants his mother buried. William Edgar Maxim was named the special administrator of his mother’s estate by a Nevada court.

“My client feels this is bizarre,” Gasink said.

A hearing on Leita Maxim’s will is scheduled for Sept. 4 in Nevada. Maxim, formerly known as Leita O. Weymouth, had lived in Augusta and was retired from the New England Telephone and Telegraph Co. and AT&T.