An 82-year-old widow came home last week to find someone had broken into her New York apartment and stolen her late husband's ashes, police said on Tuesday.
Bernice Immordino of Long Island, who lost her husband a decade ago, told Fox News on Tuesday that when she came home on Oct. 29 around 12:45 p.m. she saw that her living room and bedroom had been ransacked; her husband’s ashes, jewelry, credit cards, cowboy hat collection and other items were gone.
“It was upsetting,” Immordino told Fox News on Tuesday. “It’s very sad.”
Wednesday would have been her 64th wedding anniversary, which makes the loss of the ashes even more difficult. Immordino, a real estate agent who lives in North Bellmore, said she cried when she realized the ashes were gone, describing them as the most precious item that she had.
She said everything that was stolen can be replaced except for those remains, which were inside a gold treasure chest. Immordino said she has another gold treasure chest that is meant for her ashes when she dies, but the burglars left that vessel behind.
“Both our children were going to bury us together ... but now that’s not happening,” Immordino said, adding that the burglars must have thought there were valuable in that other chest, which was heavier and sealed.
“The other one, they thought something precious was in it. Which there was.”
“They broke a window in the living room. They smashed it,” Immordino said.
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Immordino told Fox News detectives have been keeping her updated on their investigation since the break-in.
“One of the credit cards was tried to be used that same day at a gas station in Hicksville [Long Island], so the police right now are trying to look at the video and see if they can get the perpetrator,” she said.
Nassau County police told Fox News the investigation is ongoing.