Dead body discovered in cemetery

Springfield, Georgia (dpo) - Will the people of Springfield be able to enter their cemetery without thinking of a dead person ever again? This is the big question today as this morning, groundskeeper Otis Mielke stumbled upon a gruesome find in the south section of the cemetery. Mielke was digging down through the soil to create a pond when he came across a mysterious box. This box was found to contain a body, which led to the launch of a police investigation.

Mielke is still horrified, saying, “To start with, I hoped it might be pirate treasure. So you won’t believe just how terrified I was to suddenly find myself staring into the face of a severely decayed body.” The 53 year-old will probably be unable to stay in his line of work. “Even though I know it is highly unlikely, every time I dig another hole, I will be scared that I might find another body”, Mielke laments.

This is the box in which the body was found. It has now been sent to a forensics lab

Police are currently working on the theory that this find is the result of an attempt to conceal evidence of a violent crime. A spokesperson for the police reports: “We believe that some kind of religious ritual must be the reason why the body was interred in this way. That would explain the decision to bury the body in such an ornate box, which surely could not have come cheap, and the incredibly heavy stone marking the location.” Flowers have also regularly been deposited at the site over the past 13 years. It is as yet unclear whether these flowers are part of this ritual or simply intended to prevent digging above the body.
The stone itself presented a further gruesome discovery. One or more of the supposed perpetrators engraved the following characters on it: “Wesley Clark, *04.02.1904, †09.13.2001. R.I.P.” Police are currently investigating what this could mean and are already exploring a potential connection with masonry.
Upon further investigation of the site, officers also noted numerous other stones bearing similar engravings throughout the cemetery. “We will also be excavating the area in front of these stones, although we do not expect to find any more bodies”, concludes the police spokesperson. Surely, there could not be that many bodies here without the police having noticed anything.
ssi; idea: wwe; picture above: Joe Mabel, CC BY-SA 3.0; first published 2018-06-04
Read the German version HERE.