Two thieves pretended to be grieving relatives so they could access GTA mausoleums
Police fear some stolen heirlooms have already been sold at pawnshops
Halton police have charged two people in connection with over 300 thefts from cemeteries and mausoleums around the GTA.
According to a media release, the accused parties—a man and a woman—face dozens of similar charges and are alleged to have pretended to be grieving family members in order to gain access to mausoleums. The robberies took place during daytime hours in the Burlington and Oakville areas and were carried out using a hand tool to break into mausoleum niches.
The accused allegedly stole jewellery, cremation urns and other valuable keepsakes. In a particularly gruesome detail, they are said to have disposed of people’s ashes in order to steal the vessels that contained them. They allegedly sold the stolen items at pawnshops, and police are working on recovering them.
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Earlier this month, the pair were arrested at a Niagara Falls motel. Charges against them include theft under $5,000, indignity to a dead body, possession of property obtained by crime and unauthorized possession of a weapon.
At a news conference today, deputy chief Roger Wilkie read from a statement provided by a family member of one of the deceased whose resting place was robbed: “I was outraged.... You stole from the dead. What kind of person does that?"
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Carly Lewis is a journalist whose work has appeared in the New York Times and the New York Times Magazine, Vanity Fair, Wired, Interview Magazine, Pitchfork, Elle, and Maclean’s, where she is a contributing editor. Her work has been recognized by the National Magazine Awards and the Digital Publishing Awards. She reports on city life, culture—including what people do online—politics, art and crime. She received the Dave Greber Freelance Writers Award for “The Murder of Ashley Wadsworth,” an investigative feature about a Canadian teenager who was killed by a man she met on social media, published by Maclean’s.
