Southeast : Judge Allows Use of Funds for Cemetery

A judge Thursday gave the state Cemetery Board authority to use restricted trust funds to reopen a Santa Fe Springs cemetery, where remains had been dug up and cast aside so plots could be resold.

However, it remained uncertain whether the board, which had ordered Paradise Memorial Park closed down at 6 p.m. Wednesday, would act on Los Angeles Superior Court Commissioner Bruce E. Mitchell’s ruling.

Ray Giunta, executive director of the Cemetery Board, could not be reached for comment on Mitchell’s ruling, which gives the board access to $4,500 a week--up to $25,000--in the cemetery’s trust money to keep it running.

A steady stream of family members filed by the locked gates of the cemetery Thursday, frustrated and angry that state officials had closed the grounds for lack of funds.

Brian McDowell of Compton had come with his brother to visit their mother’s grave only to discover that the cemetery, where corpses were allegedly disinterred so graves could be resold, had been closed to the public the day before.

The once-constant lines of people waiting to review Paradise Memorial Park’s records in recent weeks were gone. The sprinklers were turned off and the yellow grass that had been turning green in recent days was again being scorched by the sun.

“We paid to have Mom here,” McDowell said. “We paid to have legal rights to that property. They’re taking something away from us.”

But state cemetery officials said they had little choice but to close the cemetery. Giunta had requested $671,000 in emergency funds from Gov. Pete Wilson to keep the park open. But Wilson recently declined the request, saying such emergency funds are available only when life or property is threatened, as in a natural disaster, an official said.