Africa | 7 February 2016 22:40 CET
Grave robbers plunder hundreds of tombs in Sierra Leone
By AFP
Freetown (AFP) - New security measures were in place Sunday at cemeteries in the Sierra Leone capital Freetown after grave robbers used pickaxes and sledge hammers to pry open tombs and steal coffins and jewellery.
Around 250 graves were targeted in three of Freetown's seven cemeteries over the past two months, Freetown City Council said in a statement on Saturday.
At one of the cemeteries targeted, Kingtom, 60 percent of the more than 6,000 graves were those of Ebola victims.
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Abdul Rahman, caretaker of Kingtom cemetery, told the radio station that the robbers forced "open concrete graves and vaults to steal ornaments, chains, wedding rings and clothes from the dead".
"The vandals sometimes remove corpses from expensive mahogany and polished coffins and I suspect the coffins are later sold off to some local undertakers," he added.
Read more at: https://www.modernghana.com/news/673...rra-leone.html
Grave robbers plunder hundreds of tombs in Sierra Leone
By AFP
Freetown (AFP) - New security measures were in place Sunday at cemeteries in the Sierra Leone capital Freetown after grave robbers used pickaxes and sledge hammers to pry open tombs and steal coffins and jewellery.
Around 250 graves were targeted in three of Freetown's seven cemeteries over the past two months, Freetown City Council said in a statement on Saturday.
At one of the cemeteries targeted, Kingtom, 60 percent of the more than 6,000 graves were those of Ebola victims.
...
Abdul Rahman, caretaker of Kingtom cemetery, told the radio station that the robbers forced "open concrete graves and vaults to steal ornaments, chains, wedding rings and clothes from the dead".
"The vandals sometimes remove corpses from expensive mahogany and polished coffins and I suspect the coffins are later sold off to some local undertakers," he added.
Read more at: https://www.modernghana.com/news/673...rra-leone.html