PROVIDENCE, R.I. — A Rhode Island cemetery buried two men in the wrong plots, and now officials are trying to broker a solution. One family wants their loved one to stay where he is, but the other wants him put in the grave site they picked.
The problem started in October, when a 65-year-old man was placed in the wrong family plot at Pocasset Hill Cemetery in Tiverton. No one noticed until March, when an 87-year-old man who was supposed to be buried there died. Ron Helger, superintendent of the cemetery, told The Newport Daily News he realized what happened the day before the funeral, as he arrived to dig the grave.
The 87-year-old was then buried in the other man's plot, which is about 10 yards away from his family plot. Each plot had room for four graves, and both men were the first to be buried in the plots.
“You've got to put him somewhere,” Anne Turcotte, chairwoman of the town cemetery commission, said when asked why he was buried in the other man's plot. “You cannot put him with the man who's in another grave.”
It was not clear when the 87-year-old's family became aware of the switch and whether it was before or after he was buried. City officials were not sure and would not release the names of the people involved. Helger did not return a message left at a phone listing under his name.
