Families upset over party held at Warwick cemetery

FAMILIES are distressed at the disrespect shown to relatives’ final resting place after a party took place at the Warwick Cemetery at the weekend.

Warwick mother Jenny Thornton was at the cemetery until dusk on Sunday night cleaning up mess and retrieving objects that were stolen from the grave site of her husband Danny, who passed away in 2016.

“When we went out there we found people had taken all the flowers and ornaments off othThe er people’s graves,” Mrs Thornton said.

“All Danny’s pretty solar lights were broken and they had moved a pot of flowers and some rocks that we had put on his grave.”

Decorations had been stolen from all the surrounding graves and placed in a big pile over two graves in the same section of the cemetery.

Mrs Thornton said she found beer bottles and football match tickets in the bins when retrieving flowers.

“It looks as if someone has had a bit of a party out there,” she said.

Warwick Police and Southern Downs Regional Council are aware of the vandalism.

Senior Constable Jeremy Lambert said police would be increasing night patrols of the cemetery area.

Southern Downs Regional Council Cemeteries Team Leader, Mark McGowan said the council was taking the reports of vandalism very seriously.

“In the 20 years that I have been involved in the cemeteries, there have been very few reports of damage of vandalism.”