Posted on 06/21/2013 7:33:40 AM PDT by JoeProBono
APPLE VALLEY Calif- Unable to pay for a funeral, an Apple Valley woman reportedly told sheriff's deputies she was forced to bury her husband in a shallow grave in the couple's backyard weeks after the man died, according to San Bernardino County Sheriff's officials. Investigators are trying to determine if the man died of natural causes.
The identity of the deceased man has not been released. The woman has also not been identified but neighbors and San Bernardino County property records show they are Thomas and Yvonne Winn.
"She's a really nice lady," said Colin Wilson who lives behind the Winns. "She would always wave to me every morning."
Apple Valley deputies were called out to a home in the 16000 block of Navajo Road around 1 p.m. Wednesday for a welfare check on a 63-year-old man, according to authorities.
At the home, deputies found the man's 59-year-old wife who told deputies her husband, who has not been identified, had died weeks earlier, according to sheriff's officials. Unable to pay for a funeral, she reportedly told officials she buried him in the backyard.
"I saw her kneel down near where the cops started digging and she just broke down," Wilson said. "She was obviously devastated."
The man's body was found in a shallow grave and his body did not appear to have any obvious signs of trauma, sheriff's officials said.
The woman was not arrested pending a cause of death ruling from the coroner, according to Cindy Bachman, spokeswoman for the sheriff's department.
Neighbors said the 63-year-old man had been ill for some time.
Touched by the woman's situation, Wilson and his sister, Emily Wilson, decided to set up an online fundraising account through Fundrazr.com where people can donate to help bury the woman's husband.
"I just feel terrible for her," he said. "I can't imagine what she went through."
In the first hour, the online fundraising effort had already raised $120.
Phyllis Jerscheid, owner of Jerschied's Men's Apparel in Victorville, said she would donate a suit to the Winns so he could be buried.
"This story just broke my heart,"Jerscheid said from her busy store on Hesperia Road. "I wanted to help in some small way."
The couple had recently purchased the home in November but moved in early this year, said Wilson, after some repairs had been made to the property.
"She was out there almost every day painting and fixing up that house all by herself," Wilson said. "She's a really strong lady."
A day after their neighborhood was overtaken by sheriff's investigators, news vans now lined Navajo Road.
"It's really weird to think that she was able to do this and no one saw anything," said Wilson as he stood in his back yard which faced the rear of the couple's home. "We all have chain link fences here and we can see right into each others back yards. I can't believe no one saw anything."
It's a violation of the state's health and safety code to bury a human body anywhere other than an approved and recognized cemetery.
To donate, visit, www.fundrazr.com and search Thomas Winn.
I think the best argument is to look at why people defend cremation - it’s right up here in the thread. The concept that the ‘spirit is everything the body is nothing’, is being reinforced by cremation.
It’s one thing for a body to turn to dust by the passage of time, quite another to deliberately turn a body to dust. You wouldn’t dig up a body and cremate the body would you? Why not? If the ‘body is nothiing’, then there’s no reason not to dig up the body because you aren’t defiling anything.
“Christians believe in the resurrection of the body, thus defilement of graves and bodies in graves is wrong.”
By this reasoning, only well-embalmed bodies older than a few hundred years will be resurrected.
So the poor schmucks who just buried their dead thousands of years ago are just SOL because the bodies have turned to dust?
I’m guessing Enoch is the exception because “God took him”?!
One of our friends said years ago, heck just dump me down the septic tank.....but the family buried him when he died...
“It’s one thing for a body to turn to dust by the passage of time, quite another to deliberately turn a body to dust.”
OK, since we aren’t going to discuss actual scripture, what about Christian contagious plague victims who were cremated to prevent spread of nasty pathogens?
Since God did a good job telling us what we could and could not eat, I would think he would have been similarly explicit with instructions if preservation of the deceased’s physical body is so important.
I’m sorry, I can’t agree that God prohibits cremation based upon some extrapolation and Christian teachings that can’t be backed up by scriptural reference.
I respect your belief but cannot agree with it.
When I was about 7 or 8 (in the 50's), I can remember a cemetery being dug up in Rochester, NY, to put in an expressway. From that day forward, I was determined to be cremated. I didn't want my bones being dug up 100 years later so they could put a road in.
My sister was cremated in NY State in 2011. She’d already bought what she used to call her drawer (mausoleum) years before. The urn was included. I only paid for the actual cremation, which was arranged with a funeral director. He didn’t have his own crematory, but had an agreement with one. He picked her up at the hospice care home, took her to the crematory, took care of the obit, death certificates, and other paperwork, contacted the cemetery for internment, and brought her ashes to the cemetery the day of the funeral. I paid him about $1400 for everything. I had to pay an extra fee to the cemetery to open and seal the drawer.
Yeah. I understand the need for such rules in highly populated areas. Out where I live there is roughly one house per 60 acres.
My mother donated her body to the U Of R when she died in 1990. A funeral director had to be paid to retrieve her body from the hospital she had died in, and transport it to the U of R. When they were done with her, they called my sister to come pick up her ashes. We already had a spot for her next to our father, and had to pay the cemetery to take care of her internment.
As far as I know, Social Security only pays if there is a living dependent. My sister died having never married, and had no dependents. Social Security didn't pay anything.
I hear wood-chipper rentals are cheap....
I hope they aren't still alive when you pass....
When my father died back in 1985 he was cremated. I think they had a provision for a rental coffin for the service. My dad in his best years had a terrific sense of humor, and didn’t mind occasionally offending others with it. He was probably looking down and getting great pleasure out of knowing his last home before that urn was a rented coffin!
The cats, of course.
Thank you!
I hear wood-chipper rentals are cheap....
Well I sure as hell hope they are, because there's no way I want to outlive my kids. Not only because it's not the normal cycle of life, but also because I don't want to have to clean out their apartments. My oldest son never throws anything away, and my youngest son is a slob. I've already told him that if he dies before me, I'm not cleaning his apartment out, but giving him a Viking funeral by setting his place on fire with him in it.
That means killing them when you die... I’m not sure I can get 100% on board with that, but it’s your call. Any pets still alive when I croak will go to someone who will love them.
I can relate to the story of your younger son.
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