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Attorney urges more security at Ventura cemetery
Judge asked to order Ivy Lawn to install cameras, guard to deter theft
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More from Local NewsAn attorney whose clients say someone stole their valuables at Ivy Lawn Memorial Park in Ventura asked a judge Wednesday to order the cemetery to beef up security.
Attorney Greg Ramirez filed papers asking Ventura County Superior Court Judge Ken Riley to force Ivy Lawn officials to immediately install working security cameras and post a guard to prevent thefts.
In a very brief hearing, the judge took no action, to allow Ivy Lawn's lawyer, Thomas Olson, some time to respond to Ramirez's request for a permanent injunction.
The judge set a hearing for Sept. 10.
Last week, Ramirez filed a class-action lawsuit against the cemetery, blaming grave robbers for the thefts and alleging that Ivy Lawn managers told families the valuables would be safe in the glass-front niches.
A niche is a recess on a wall where cremated human remains are kept in an urn, and where some people place jewelry, a family heirloom or some other memento of their loved one.
The lawsuit contends a total of five people have made reports to police about thefts from Ivy Lawn glass-front niches.
Olson declined to comment on the hearing but issued a two-page statement Wednesday afternoon from the cemetery board.
Ivy Lawn was saddened by the thefts, the statement said, and it "offers its condolences to those who have suffered losses in the particularly unfeeling and mercenary nature of these thefts."
As a result, Ivy Lawn has taken several steps including hiring a security service, installing a 24-hour security camera system and sending letters about the thefts to other niche owners.
Ivy Lawn, however, said it isn't liable for the five thefts which were reported to police.
"Ivy Lawn has never advertised that it was a fortress," the statement said. "It has never advertised that it was invulnerable to acts of vandals and thieves."
Ramirez filed the lawsuit July 31 on behalf of John Herrera and David and Barbara Austin.
The suit alleged that Ivy Lawn continued to tell people that its niches were in "safe and secure" places even after thefts occurred.
Rita Heard of Camarillo, in an interview Wednesday, said she read a news report in The Star on the thefts, and that her family's heirlooms and mementoes were stolen from her mother's niche at Ivy Lawn.
"We are pretty much heartbroken over the whole thing," she said. "We're glad this is coming to light because other families need to be aware."
Posted by uknow1 on August 9, 2007 at 5:44 a.m. (Suggest removal)
It is sad I guess, but if we have to hide our valuables at home, and rent safe-deposit boxes at the bank to protect our valuables and keepsakes, why would anyone actually believe thier's would be safe in an unlocked, "glass niche" in a semi-public place?
Posted by BeaHappi on August 9, 2007 at 9:51 a.m. (Suggest removal)
uknow1 - I thought the same thing. I've seen these niches. I love the idea of a tribute to someone who has passed, but would never leave priceless and irreplaceable items in one of them.
Posted by schlederdecopan on August 9, 2007 at 10:08 a.m. (Suggest removal)
The cemetery thieves are well established in the City of San Buenaventura.
The grave desecrators have hit earlier some 42 years ago, when they completely removed some 600 headstones, flush markers, crypts and family plot curbs from the graves of 3,000 'resting souls' at the St. Mary's/Protestant and Hebrew Cemeteries, 1 mile east of the Mission doors on Main St.
They didn't try to re-sell the headstones for profit. They just simply trucked them all up to their storage yard in Hall Canyon and when the time was right, pushed them off the 100' cliff to the dry barranca below.
They even went so far as to rename the cemetery site in order to hide their 'illegal' (to this day) grave desecration. The cover-up name is now Cemetery Memorial Park(?). Though they are ashamed to post any signage as to just what the 7 acre cemetery is.
It is a cemetery and will always be a cemetery until the 3,000 dead are exhumed and re-buried in another cemetery. It can not be a 'passive' park. This is a invention by the grave desecrators to cover their tracks.
These grave desecrators are none other than our City Council!
Granted, today's City Council did not actually do the grave desecration, but when requested to restore the cemetery to it's legal status by hundreds of the 'living descendants of the deceased' and the general public, to install a legal perimeter fence, legal signs, legal grave markings and making it illegal for dog owners to use the cemetery for dog duty....this City Council (today's Mayor Morehouse, Weir, Fulton, Brennan, Monahan, Andrews and Summers (did not vote) has done everything in their power to "maintain and condone" the massive grave desecration and keep this cemetery an "ongoing" daily cemetery desecration!
That would suggest that this City Council is just as guilty as all of the past Councils that allow the resting place of our Ventura County Fore-Fathers to be desecrated ON A DAILY BASIS!
You can help. Do not re-elect the council members running for re-election this November:
Mayor Morehouse
Christie Weir
Bill Fulton
And if you're interested, there's another 3,850 desecrated graves beneath the 1920 Holy Cross School just west of the Mission on Main Street...the original Mission Cemetery. It seems like the Catholic Archdiocese of Los Angeles and the Cardinal Mahoney would like to get into the grave desecration business also.
This school house must come down!
Saddam Hussein would be so proud of the City Council of San Buenaventura and the Archdiocese of Los Angeles for successfully maintaining 7,000 desecrated graves in our town.
Please see www.restorestmarys.org for the details.
God Help Us
Posted by AnnaWhaat on August 11, 2007 at 9:42 p.m. (Suggest removal)
Ivy Lawn managers told families the valuables would be safe in the glass-front niches, When Management tells you they are safe then they should be safe ! And I do believe they are locked? Not sure but I would definately think so.
schlederdecopan,As for your comment I agree this is tragic ! How can this possibly be justified ! My heart goes out to the resting souls in this graveyard......thier families and loved ones. Although I do believe the soul leaves the body upon death. This is just disrepectful !!!!!!! Turn it back into a cemetary! Put the headstones back at the cities expense!
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