Ray Hebbard was left in shock on Friday when he went to check on the rose bushes he had planted at the All Saints Anglican Church’s interment garden, only to find some missing.
“I went up there (on Friday) to check on the watering and four of my rose bushes have been ripped out of the ground,” Mr Hebbard said.
“Two of them were only planted a fortnight ago, so I think someone has seen me plant them and taken them out before they got rooted into the ground.
“It’s quite a terrible thing really. It’s disrespectful and it’s just wanton destruction, and an interment garden is for remembering the dead.
“For someone to just uproot the rose bushes from this garden and take them away just boggles belief.”
Mr Hebbard, whose wife is interred in the garden, said it was the first instance of trouble with the garden in the 45 years since it was installed.
“We’ve never had anything stolen or damaged from this garden before since it was put in in 1974,” he said.
“To think that someone would do that where a garden has been established to remember loved ones who have passed on, it’s despicable.”
Mr Hebbard said the thief had taken two newly-planted red and yellow rose bushes, along with a purple rose bush that had been planted four years ago and a pink rose bush that was more than 20 years ago at sometime during the night of Thursday, January 17.
“We can replace the rose bushes but the question I have is just ‘why?’,” he said.
“It’s not right.”
