Updated: 10:22 p.m. CT June 21, 2007
FITCHBURG, Mass. - Police say a gravedigger stole body parts including a skull and a thigh bone from a broken casket at a church cemetery and took them home to make an ashtray.
While he was digging a grave, a casket was broken open, so (investigators) believe he took the body parts to make an ashtray and a pipe, Police Lt. Kevin OBrien told the Sentinel & Enterprise of Fitchburg.
Police discovered the theft when they went to his apartment Wednesday after his wife complained that her husband, Keith Chartrand, killed her dog. She said she found the body parts among his belongings.
Police charged Chartrand, 30, with removing a body from a grave and cruelty to animals.
Fitchburg District Court Judge Arthur Haley III ordered Chartrand held on $50,000 bail at a court hearing on Wednesday where Chartrand told the judge the charges against him was bogus.
Chartrands lawyer, Martin Maynard, did not immediately return a call to The Associated Press on Thursday.
The Rev. Edward Chalmers of St. Bernards Cemetery said he believed the remains probably were taken from an older part of the cemetery where many graves did not have vaults.
Proverbs 18:10..The Name of the Lord is a Strong Tower; the righteous run into it and are safe.
