Rhode Island Veterans Affairs: Kasim Yarn confesses they’ve buried six or more people in the wrong graves
Veterans Affairs and the conditions for military vets was huge talking point for President Trump and the Trump campaign, so expect news from Rhode Island to fuel more controversy and criticism.
Kasim Yarn, director of Veterans Affairs for the state of Rhode Island, made the admission Monday in a statement to the Associated Press that they’ve buried more than a half dozen people in the wrong graves after markers were incorrectly placed.
“We recognize our cemetery is hallowed ground, and we did not meet our obligation to our veterans, their loved ones who are buried here or the families and the veterans who continue to come to our cemetery to pay their respects,” Yarn said to ABC6.
The Rhode Island Veterans Memorial Cemetery workers were transferring the remains of a veteran’s father in Nov. 2010 and discovered the mix up. They left two open plots but only accounted for one resulting in the markers all being off from the correct plots.
stock photo supplied by Find a Grave
Grounds crew working to dig a grave found the plot only had room for one person. Yarn said the deceased were moved to their correct graves over the weekend.
Yarn confessed that as many as 21 graves were affected, but only seven burials have been performed in the row in question since 2010.
He added that no employees were punished as a result of the incident, and that new measures are being put in place to make sure something like this doesn’t happen again.
One of those new measures includes requiring a second cemetery worker to confirm their colleagues are burying bodies in the correct location.
More than 34,000 people are buried at Rhode Island Veterans Cemetery in Warwik.
Around 1,200 burials occur each year.
