No tag or message against a community have been noted. According to the first elements of the investigation, the reasons for these acts would relate to “a bronze flight traffic”.
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“Doing this a few days before All Saints’ Day, I am outraged. It’s revolting.” In the aisles of the Pont-de-Justice cemetery, in Nîmes, Elisabeth (she did not wish to give her name) , who came to clean the family vault, does not hide his anger this Sunday. A few days earlier, on the night of Wednesday 26 to Thursday, October 27, around sixty funeral monuments were degraded. Statues, crosses of Christ, plates were torn off from tombstones. On certain steles, there remains only a trace in the shape of a cross, and four holes. All funeral objects have disappeared. They were unscrewed.
On the spot, three days after the facts, in the silence of meditation always reigns a feeling of amazement. “When I learned that, I hurried to come, testifies Yves Marty, who lives in the neighboring department of Hérault. The graves of my loved ones are not affected but it is revolting for families to whom it happens . “
The break -in was noted by one of the guards of the site in the early morning on Thursday. To penetrate inside the enclosure, the criminals broke part of the wall (from the reburse by the municipal agents). No tag or message against a community were noted. Maryline Morel, who came to flourish the grave of her parents, does not understand. “It’s madness anyway! Why such acts? It is incomprehensible. It seems to me that in each confession we respect the dead.”
“Odious scenes”
The Pont-de-Justice, with its 14 hectares, is the largest cemetery in the Gard Prefecture (150,000 inhabitants). We circulate there thanks to many pedestrian alleys which serve the 14,000 graves. Very busy, especially during this period, the place benefits from police surveillance in this weekend of the feast of the dead, like the other three cemeteries of the city. “We do not expect this kind of event here, it’s great, permanently monitored. It is a bit of the historic cemetery, that of the old Nîmes families, there are always people,” observes a couple .
According to the first elements of the investigation, reported by Christine Tournier-Barnier, municipal councilor delegated to the general administration, the reasons for these acts would relate to “a bronze flight traffic”. “These are bronze symbols that were first stolen, objects that are sold well. A virgin has also been stolen but she was found in a ditch. She had to be too heavy.” An investigation is underway, Fingerprints were taken to try to find the thieves. The city has never experienced such acts of vandalism in its cemeteries.
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