Graves Dug Up to Resell Plots, Cops Say
Four cemetery workers have been charged with dismembering bodies after police found what they called "startling and revolting" conditions at a historic cemetery near Chicago.
Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart says workers at the Burr Oak Cemetery in Alsip allegedly dug up more than 100 graves, dumped the bodies into unmarked mass graves and resold the plots to unsuspecting members of the public.
The three men and one woman were charged Thursday with one count each of dismembering a human body.
The sheriff's investigation began six weeks ago when the cemetery's owner reported that an employee who began feeling guilty revealed what allegedly had been going on, possibly for as long as four years, Dart said.
"All of us who were working on this for the last week were pretty distraught," Dart said. "You start with the premise of your own loved ones and how they are cared for after they are buried, but there is also a true significance to this particular cemetery."
Chicago native Emmett Till, whose 1955 lynching at age 14 added impetus to the civil rights movement, is buried at Burr Oak. It's also the final resting place of singers Dinah Washington, Willie Dixon, and Otis Spann, as well as former world heavyweight boxing champion Ezzard Charles, Harlem Globetrotter Inman Jackson, and several Negro League baseball players.
"For many years, this was the only cemetery where African Americans could be buried," said Spencer Leak Sr., president of Leak and Sons Funeral Home, noting that Burr Oak once was owned by Ebony Magazine publisher John Johnson.
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