Families upset after equipment damages Moncks Corner cemetery

MONCKS CORNER, S.C. (WCBD) – Family members are raising concerns after discovering damage – including broken headstones – at a Moncks Corner cemetery.

A deputy with the Berkeley County Sheriff’s Office was dispatched to Plantation Memorial Gardens on Sunday after receiving a call from an upset family.

According to a report from the sheriff’s office, Mark Fields was at the cemetery with his family visiting their mother’s grave on Sunday when they saw a man across the property who was irate and yelling.

When Fields and his family went to check on the man, they learned he was angry over how the cemetery looked and had been speaking to an employee there. Fields told the deputy he agreed with the man and said their mother’s headstone has been broken in half.

While investigating, the deputy said they saw several headstones with tire tracks and piles of debris near the graves. The headstone belonging to Fields’ mother was cracked down the center and was marked with tire tracks.

Deputies also spoke with the other man who said he arrived at the cemetery early Sunday morning and was very upset at the way it looked, noting he was last there in January and it “was not like that.”

An employee told deputies the condition of the ground was from the equipment they use to dig graves.