A headstone fell on a 10-month-old girl at a cemetery in Detroit, Michigan. Now, the child is in the hospital.
On Mother’s Day, Jessica McFadden and her relatives had gone to her grandmother’s burial site at Gethsemane Cemetery. She then put her daughter, Melani, in front of the headstone in order to take a picture. It then fell on her.
“The headstone was not properly placed. I didn’t know if my baby was alive under there. I couldn’t hear my baby, couldn’t see my baby,” McFadden stated.
“She had a huge knot. It was bleeding on the back of her head. At that moment, my daughter started vomiting, and she went out,” the mother added.
After Melani was rushed to a medical facility, it was learned that she suffered a fractured skull.
” …this tombstone was a disaster waiting to happen. We have preliminary information that because of the staffing shortages, they had to cut back on what they do. This is what happens when we cut funding… in our public services..,” stated the McFadden family lawyer.
The family says that it seems as if other headstones had also fallen.
The cemetery is owned by the city of Detroit. In a statement, the city says that headstones are put in by third party companies that the families pay for. They also say that there hasn’t been any documentation of fallen headstones prior to this incident.
The McFadden family says that the headstone was placed there five years ago. They are working to validate who did the installment.
“… this could’ve been all prevented. Had it been properly placed, properly kept, whatever could’ve been done. This could’ve been totally prevented,” Jessica McFadden stated.
