Angel statue containing baby’s ashes stolen
Anguished mother pleads for its return, no questions asked
The Bonilla family has an angel that watches over their east Hamilton home.
The heavy four-foot statue contains the ashes of Vanessa and Saul Bonilla’s only son.
On Wednesday night, it was in the front garden of their house on Rosslyn Avenue North where it has stood vigil for the last seven years.
By Thursday morning, their beloved angel was gone.
“I was devastated,” Vanessa Bonilla said. “I just need it back. I’m hoping and praying I get it back.”
Bonilla was seven-months pregnant with twins — one girl and one boy — when she got the crushing news during a medical appointment that her son no longer had a heartbeat. Baby Saul was stillborn May 12, 2008.
“It was a big loss for us,” she said. “We got his ashes in an urn and we had it on our fireplace. But I was never happy having him on the fireplace. I didn’t feel like he was free.”
One day, she was at a greenhouse and saw the statue.
“The angel was so beautiful,” she said. “I knew that was where I wanted him. I felt like this is where I could put his ashes and he’ll be at peace, but still with us. I felt like he was an angel who was watching over us and protecting us.”
Saul’s nine-year-old twin, Adrianna, has a particularly special connection with the angel.
“She talks to it,” said her mom. “I don’t have the heart to tell her.”
The family, which also includes five-year-old Sofia, is moving to Niagara Falls. They had so far kept the angel at their Hamilton home.
“We’re doing the foundation around the new house and I didn’t want it to get broken,” said Bonilla, who is a child-care provider at a Niagara daycare.
“But I should have brought it anyway,” she says, bursting into tears.
Bonilla has not yet involved the police and has one message for the thief who ripped the angel from their garden: “No questions asked, please just return it. You don’t even have to say you’re sorry.”