A distraught family are demanding an apology from a local authority after their brother was buried in the wrong grave. They claim they were assured Clive Stephenson’s plot would be next to his mother’s, yet he has been lain to rest a distance away on the edge of the burial ground.
Sisters, Vivienne and Jean Honeyghan, say mourners were unaware of the change until the 50-year-old body was placed in the ground on the day of his funeral at Handsworth cemetery in Birmingham. Then, it was too late to protest, reports BirminghamLive.
To add to their anguish, father-of-seven Clive was placed in a plot so sodden, it was filling with water as the coffin was lowered. Birmingham City Council has met the family on-site in a bid to resolve the issue.
Vivienne said: "They could not have placed my brother farther from my mother if they tried. They’ve made him look like the black sheep of the family."
They have offered to exhume the body, at their own cost, and place it in the grave of another sister, Ionia Stephenson, who died only months after Clive. The local authority has told them it cannot put Clive, one of nine siblings, close to his mother Rita’s 40-year-old grave because that section of the cemetery is no longer used for burials.
But Vivienne - a cousin of former boxing world champ Lloyd Honeyghan - alleges graves have been placed in the area since her brother’s death, from a brain tumour, in February 2020. They want the council to pay for a memorial stone on Clive’s grave - as an acknowledgement of mistakes made - and say sorry.
They are being supported by Bishop Desmond Jaddoo who conducted the funeral service at Handsworth’s New Life Wesleyan Church in March 2020. The bishop has dubbed the council’s handling of the matter “shoddy” and “arrogant” claiming the authority is no longer communicating with him or the family.
Vivienne says she was too grief-stricken on the day of the funeral to fully comprehend her brother was being buried in the wrong plot. She said: “Clive’s last wish was to be buried near his mother and that was agreed. That was the plan. If I’d known, then and there, it was the wrong place I would’ve stopped it in a split second. A lot of the family were totally distraught, but, at the time, what can you do?
“On the same day, I contacted the undertaker and said, ‘this is not what was agreed’. I was given an assurance they would look into it and, to use their words, ‘heads would roll’.”
Vivienne has claimed she later learned a decision was made on the day of the funeral to change plots - the one where Clive was intended to be interred had become badly waterlogged. Yet he was placed in a pool of a grave. Even the bishop asked if anything could be done to stop the water pouring in,” she said.
“We paid so much money for that grave. We are a close family. He is miles from the rest of his family. His last wish has not been realised. The council messed up. We want them to take responsibility, we want an apology stating they have done this.”
Bishop Jaddoo said: “I think the family have been treated shoddily. They no longer want their brother moved, they don’t want to go through the trauma again. His final wish was to be buried as close as possible to his mother. They buried him on the edge of Handsworth Cemetery, it could not be farther from his mother’s grave.
A spokesman for the local authority responded: “Unfortunately, the request for the late Mr Stephenson to be buried as close to his mother’s grave as possible was not passed onto Handsworth Cemetery prior to the funeral. However, any request to locate a grave in a specific area cannot be guaranteed due to the uncertainty of ground conditions, and the paperwork which the family of the late Mr Stephenson signed, makes this clear.
"On the day in question, extremely heavy rainfall and high water table level had made the area in which the late Mr Stephenson was intended to be buried impossible to excavate and so, in accordance with the cemetery’s terms and conditions, the closest available traditional style grave, was used.
"The council is now in discussion with the family and Desmond Jadoo to seek a resolution. The city has apologised to the family immediately for the understandable upset which these events caused when it was brought to our attention and has explained the reasons behind it."
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