DOUGLAS COUNTY, Ga. — A mother said her family paid for a plot and marker and laid her teenage son to rest after he was murdered.
Now, she says the cemetery told her the receipts and contract are bogus, and that the plot does not belong to her.
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Channel 2′s Tom Jones was in Douglas County on Tuesday, where the sheriff’s office told him that it has opened up an investigation into allegations of fraud at the cemetery.
The sheriff’s office said it is investigating an employee, or perhaps more than one employee, for taking money for plots, headstones and markers and forging signatures for the transactions.
Beverly La Fleur said it happened to her, and now her son can’t rest in peace because he may have to move.
“Tom, I’m just beside myself with this whole thing,” La Fleur said. “I can’t sleep because my son is not resting in peace.”
Samuel Moon was one of two teens killed after a Sweet 16 birthday party in Douglas County in March. The teens were innocent bystanders when the gunmen opened fire.
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La Fleur and her family paid for a plot and marker and laid Moon to rest at the Mozley Memorial Gardens Cemetary in Lithia Springs. She said when she went back and asked why the marker wasn’t there, the cemetery told her it had no record of her purchasing anything.
“We paid, we have receipts. We have paperwork,” La Fleur said.
La Fleur said the cemetery told her the paperwork and receipts were fraudulent and the plot where Samuel is buried belongs to someone else.
“And you’re telling me that where he is, he may have to be -- I’m thinking -- that he may have to be moved,” La Fleur said.
The Douglas County Sheriff’s Office has now opened a criminal investigation into allegations of fraud at the cemetery. La Fleur said the cemetery told her more than 20 families were victims of an employee’s fraud
Jones went by the cemetery to find out what happened, but a worker said she couldn’t comment. The worker did tell him she would have the owner contact him on Wednesday.
La Fleur said it’s hard to believe someone would do this to a family who was still grieving.
“My son, my baby,” she said. “Can he rest in peace?”
La Fleur said she doesn’t want any other family to go through this.
The sheriff’s office is asking anyone who thinks they are a victim of fraud at the cemetery to give them a call.
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