Illinois Burr Oak Cemetery Lawsuits Filed Over Dug Up and Resold Graves

At least seven lawsuits have been filed against the owners and employees of Burr Oak Cemetery, a well-known Chicago cemetery, where police say buried bodies were dug up and disposed of so that the burial plots could be resold.

The Burr Oak Cemetary lawsuits have been filed by the families of people buried in the cemetery, whose bodies are now missing. The cemetery manager and three workers at the Illinois cemetery are suspected of digging up hundreds of bodies and leaving them in the open air on a vacant lot on the cemetery grounds.

Arizona-based Perpetua, LLC, owns and operates Burr Oak Cemetery and has been named as defendant in the lawsuits. In addition, four employees at the cemetery, Carolyn Towns, Keith Nicks, Terrence Nicks, and Maurice Dailey, have been arrested and charged with body dismemberment.

Burr Oak Cemetery, which is located in Alsip, Ill., was the first cemetery dedicated to African Americans and contains the bodies of several famous African American figures. Emmett Till, a young boy who was lynched while visiting the South during the Civil Rights movement, was buried there. Although Till’s current grave, where he has been buried since his body was exhumed in 2005 as part of a new investigation into the death, does not appear to have been disturbed, his original glass-top casket, which was to be preserved for a memorial, was found in the corner of a shed, infested with a family of possums.

Some of the lawsuits filed are seeking class action status, arguing that the number of plaintiffs is likely to be in the thousands, and that the defendants and findings of fact are likely to be virtually identical in all cases. The lawsuits seek compensation for the emotional distress suffered by family members, among other damages.

According to one Burr Oak Cemetery class action lawsuit filed by plaintiffis Kevin Majors and Edward Strickland, the scope of plaintiffs may not be limited to people related to those whose burial sites were desecrated. “[T]he class extends to all persons whose family members are buried in the same sections of the cemetery where bodies have been disturbed, all of whom are entitled, at a minimum, to reasonable assurances from the Defendants,” the lawsuit filing argues.

The Cook County sheriff’s office has declared the entire cemetery a crime scene. State officials have begun procedures for revoking Perpetua’s license and officials are seeking an injunction to halt any more burials at the cemetery.

Sheriff deputies said last week that at least 300 gravesites have been confirmed as disturbed, and they expect that number to rise. One entire section devoted to children appears to be missing, law enforcement officials noted.