'Oh Snap, A Foot!' Family Horrified When Corpse's Leg Lands On Father's Casket
BUTLER, N.J. (CBSNewYork) -- During a burial at a cemetery in New Jersey, the family of a father and grandfather received a horrifying shock.
As the eulogy got underway, grieving relatives said they saw a body part from another grave on his coffin.
"I can hardly eat, I can hardly sleep, it's taking its toll on me," Sandra Butler told CBS2's Dave Carlin.
Butler said she didn't think losing her 85-year-old father Cleveland Butler could be any more traumatizing than it was on the day that he died of a stroke.
Then, a week ago as she and her family from Brooklyn went to bury him in a picturesque New Jersey cemetery it got worse.
Coming from out of the dirt of his grave was the bare leg from another corpse.
"I'm there to bury my father and there's somebody's foot on top of his casket," she said.
"I saw what appeared to be a left leg," Alonzo Butler added.
"They was like, 'oh snap, a foot," family representative Rev. Kevin McCall explained.
Rev. McCall, who is representing the family, said the caretaker and groundsmen at the Mount Holiness Cemetery offered them no explanation.
He said even if it's routine for caskets to disintegrate, exactly why did this happen? And why didn't the family get a formal apology?
There was no one inside when a CBS2 news team went to the cemetery office.
"We had pictures of the leg and they didn't like that," Sandra said, "We reached out to the New Jersey State Cemetery Board and a spokesman said the investigation was just beginning.
The board can impose fines if it turns out laws were broken.
The family members said they want answers not just for themselves, but the loved ones of the unidentified corpse that they say turned their somber family gathering into a ghoulish freak show.
