BELFAST, Maine — Someone is pilfering plants and solar light fixtures from Grove Cemetery in Belfast, and Police Chief Mike McFadden wants to find and stop them.
“I would very much appreciate any help in determining who has been doing this down at the cemetery,” the chief said Wednesday. “I think we have someone in our community who has decided that a good place to go shopping for landscape decorations is Grove Cemetery. I just don’t get it, why a person thinks this is OK.”
Cemetery Superintendent Steve Boguen told police earlier this summer that some solar lights that had been placed at gravesites had disappeared.
“We increased our patrols at nights and on weekends,” McFadden said. “For most of the rest of the summer, we haven’t had an issue.”
But that has changed, he said. On Sunday, two people reported that not only had their solar lights vanished, flowers and plants they had planted in the ground had been dug up and taken, too.
“One gentleman lost his wife three months ago. He’s visited her grave routinely, and kept it nice,” McFadden said. “To come back a couple of days after planting the flowers and find them gone — this just takes it to a whole new level. There are other types of criminal activity that stoop lower than this, but this is among the lower things that you can do, in my opinion.”
If anyone has any information about the thefts from the cemetery, McFadden said they can contact police by calling 338-2040, by sending an email to chief@belfastmepd.org or by visiting the department’s Facebook page.