‘Heartbreaking’: Gravesites disturbed by tire tracks in China Grove cemetery

CHINA GROVE, N.C. — Someone drove through a Rowan County graveyard leaving tire tracks trenched in the ground.

There are nearly 20 acres of gravesites at West Lawn Memorial Park in China Grove.

“It’s a place where my parents are supposed to be at rest, at peace and, you know, it really bothers me that somebody would do that,” resident Nadine Cherry said.

Cherry checked her family’s plot for damage after seeing photos posted on Facebook showing fresh tire tracks found in the cemetery.

“It looks like it may be kind of close to my parents, so that’s the reason I wanted to come out and check,” Cherry said.

Randy Blevins and Tabitha Eakin found their family’s gravesites untouched.

“This is the ultimate disrespect for the living and the deceased, also,” Blevins said.

The gravestone for a two-year-old who died in 1992 was damaged and her mother, who did not want to be identified, said cemetery staff would fix it.

“It’s heartbreaking to think someone would just tear up something that you know, from somebody that you loved that’s here, that’s not here anymore,” Eakin said.

A manager at the cemetery said they are handling the matter internally, so they are not getting authorities involved.

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Cemetery staff said they are contacting families to let them know they’ll be making repairs, but they wouldn’t say who may have caused it.

West Lawn Memorial Park is the same cemetery where murdered teenager Erica Parsons was laid to rest.

Police said Erica was murdered by her adoptive parents in 2011 and it wasn’t until 2017 that her adoptive father led investigators to her body.

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