Burial bungle nightmare
Family’s six-year battle with council
SIX years after the death of his mother, a North Queensland man can finally give her the burial she deserves after a series of council failures left the family distraught.
Lygeri Angelopoulos was mistakenly buried in the wrong cemetery plot in 2016 and her grieving family, still grappling with the death, were asked to exhume and relocate her body.
To make amends the Townsville City Council lawyers promised the family it would contribute up to $5000 to install a monumental plaque.
Speaking to the Townsville Bulletin in late April, more than six years after the promise, Angelos Angelopoulos said the council never paid up.
In mid-march the disability pensioner, who is undertaking university studies, filed a minor debt claim with plans to take the council to court to recoup the money. Mr Angelopoulos said court proceedings were his final option before the statute of limitations expired after multiple calls, emails and complaints went nowhere.
“I tried as best as I could to communicate diplomatiiplomatically with the legal al department of the Townsville council,” l,” Mr Angelopoulos s said.
“(As) a public authority they are supposed to be a role model and set the stan- dards for the commmunity. It is about out integrity, ethics, honesty, honouring their word.
“My pension, over 50 per cent of it goes to rent so I don’t have much money left … I really can’t afford the cost of crosses and plaques and headstones.”
Mr Angelopoulos said he was still waiting for an answer from the council more than two months after filing the court claim, but Townsville
City Council reached out to Mr Angelopoulos on Tuesday afternoon after the Bulletin contacted its media department, asking for comment about the issue earlier that day.
Mr Angelopoulos, who has been diagnosed with a bereavement disorder, said the entire ordeal took its toll on him.
His father, Anastasios Angelopoulos, had his health deteriorate following the botched burial and the 93year-old died in 2018 before ever seeing a memorial to his wife of more than 60 years erected. Mrs Angelopoulos’s coffin remains where she was buried as plans to exhume it never went ahead in part due to her family’s strong opposition on religious and spiritual reasons.
The pair, who met in their teens, planned to lie next to each other for eternity but the bungle meant this could not happen.
Responding to a request from the Bulletin, a council spokeswoman acknowledged the initial burial bungle was “unacceptable”.
“Council apologised unreservedly to both families impacted by that error,” she said.
“Mr Angelopoulos contacted council about the matter recently and we have finalised arrangements for a suitable outcome for him and his family.”
Mr Angelopoulos does not know why it took so long for the council to act and said he hoped his step in filing a legal claim against the organisation was a “wake-up call”.
“I think they should apologise for starters,” he said. “There is a pattern here. “Hopefully they will play by the rules in the future and not do things like this.”