The fountains and garden at Holy Sepulchre Cemetery offered the only peace and quiet Becky Sanita has felt since the unexpected death of her fiancé just under two months ago.
She visited daily with her 11-year-old daughter. The pair would sit next to a niche, the columbarium, that held the cremated remains of Joseph Cote and just talk, telling him about the birthday parties, shopping trips and family dinners he was now missing.
That grief deepened last weekend, Sanita said, when they lost Cote for a second time.
When the family arrived at the Lake Avenue cemetery on Aug. 22, they found the granite covering to Cote's compartment smashed, a metal cage pried open with tools and his silver cylinder urn gone.
"It's the worst feeling in the world," Sanita
said.
Cemetery, police investigating theft of urn at Holy Sepulchre
Cemetery officials confirmed the theft and said they are working with police to investigate. Cathy Vail, the cemetery's executive director, said the cemetery has no indication other graves or compartments were targeted and believes the incident was isolated.
RPD said it is looking into the incident.
"Our prayers remain of course with Becky and her family during this, what must be an incredibly difficult time," Vail said. "It's horrific. The entire staff at Holy Sepulchre is mortified that anything like this happened. We're all speechless."
There are limited security cameras at the cemetery, mostly positioned at the entrance gates and parking lots, to respect the privacy of grieving families, Vail said. There is no video of the actual vandalism, but cemetery officials have given police all available surveillance footage from late afternoon Aug. 21, when Sanita last visited, to Aug. 22.
Sanita offered a desperate plea on Facebook for anyone who may have seen anything to contact the Rochester Police Department.
She described Cote, 51, as a "jack-of-all-trades, master-of-none" who loved the outdoors.
"There wasn't anything he couldn't fix, build or do," Sanita said. "And if he didn't know how to do it, he would figure it out. He'd do literally anything for anybody at all, whether he knew you or not. He was just a genuinely good-hearted, kind human."
The couple were together for 16 years and engaged to be married. They raised six children together: Three of Cote's from a previous relationship, two of Sanita's, and one they shared.
Sanita said the experience interrupted their painful and sacred grief.
"You have stripped him and everybody that loved him that right," she said. "It's the worst feeling in the world to know that the person that you loved, that was supposed to be safe and was going to be in that spot ― the spot that was their final, peaceful resting place — is gone and you don't know where they are."
— Kayla Canne covers community safety for the Democrat and Chronicle with a focus on immigration, police accountability, government surveillance and how people are impacted by violence. Follow her on Instagram @bykaylacanne. Get in touch at kcanne@gannett.com.
This article originally appeared on Rochester Democrat and Chronicle: Family says they lost loved one 'a second time' after urn theft
