Posted on 07/09/2009 5:47:44 PM PDT by JRochelle
CHICAGO (AFP) — Grave robbers stripped at least 300 plots at a historic black cemetery outside Chicago, dumped many of the bodies and then resold the plots for a profit, officials said Thursday.
The years-long scheme was carried out by the cemetery's manager and three gravediggers who sold the "used" graves so they could pocket the fees rather than pass them along to the Arizona-based owners.
"This was not done in a very delicate way," Cook County Sheriff Thomas Dart said at a press conference.
"They would excavate a grave, excavate the entire site and then they would proceed to dump the remains wherever they found a place to do it in the back of the cemetery."
They would also sometimes leave the remains in the grave and "pound them down and put someone else on top," Dart said.
It will likely take months before authorities can identify all of the bodies and restore the gravesites, Dart said, adding that efforts will be complicated by the fact that the cemetery's records were destroyed and altered.
"We don't know what else to tell the people, but we are horrifically sorry they have been subjected to this," Dart said.
"We are working on making this right."
The scheme came to light when Burr Oak Cemetery's Arizona-based owners contacted the sheriff's department after discovering a large discrepancy in the cemetery's finances.
Burr Oak is one of Chicago's oldest predominantly African-American cemeteries and is home to a number of historic figures, including Emmett Till, whose 1955 murder galvanized the civil rights movement.
(Excerpt) Read more at google.com ...
shoot them on site.
Black on black crime again? No way.
They're dead, Mr. Dart. You don't have to tell them anything, unless you're hanging around the cemetery on a night with a full moon.
Where are the lousy crackers who.... oh. Never mind.
Betcha this is one of the sources of the new age voters. Look closer and you may find a.c.o.r.n. involved?
You know,I can post on this but I can’t read this.It’s to sick.
Sounds like the Ford family of Memphis.
They keep preying on each other even after they are dead...really, honest to Pete, WTF...it is just too much...
The question is did they do what was rumored in Detroit so that so many had their parents remains moved to other burial plots?
And that is grave robbing as well...
WILL THAT AHOLE REV. AL BE LEADIN THE MARCH ON THIS ONE?
As despicable as it gets. Turn these thugs over to the families of those desecrated. These creeps are soul-less
This is just f*ing greed, pure and simple. The news report said the scum bags involved made a bundle reselling the burial plots. It also stated that barbershops are better regulated than the cemetary industry.
Do I need anymore incentive to make sure I’m cremated and the ashes scattered.
Obama voters.
That is absolutely unconscionable.
They’re dead Jim...
Scheming scamming blacks really have raised the “cultural thang” to an all time high...
Were the perps all white?
Just wondering.
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