VT Man Offers Grave For Dead Boston Bombing Suspect
HARTFORD, Vt. (CBS/AP) — A retired Vermont teacher offered a spot in his family's Connecticut cemetery plot to the family of the Boston Marathon bombing suspect who died last month following a shootout with police.
In a blog post Monday, Paul Keane wrote that he would offer a spot in his family plot in the Mount Carmel Burying Ground in Hamden, Conn., to the family of Tamerlan Tsarnaev, who was killed following a shootout with police four days after the April 15 bombing, if the family cannot find one elsewhere.
"The only condition is that I do it in memory of my mother who taught Sunday School at the Mt. Carmel Congregational Church for 20 years and taught me to 'love thine enemy,'" he wrote.
On Wednesday, Keane posted again noting if the funeral director declines his offer, he will donate the plots to the town.
The latest post came, he said, after reading editorials in a local newspaper asking why he doesn't donate the plot to the family of a fallen soldier.
The Massachusetts funeral director handling Tsarnaev's remains has been unable to find a cemetery where he could be buried.
Tsarnaev's family has received 120 offers of cemetery plots, but Worcester funeral home director Peter Stefan has said none of graves have worked out because officials in those cities and towns don't want the body.
Hamden Mayor Scott Jackson said he first heard about the offer from a reporter.
"I certainly hope if this offer is legitimate, and is legitimately being offered in the spirit of whom it claims to be, then I would guess it would actually be done in a different way — in a quiet way, in a Christian way, that requested or required no additional comment," Jackson said.
Keane grew up in Hamden. He retired a year ago after teaching English for about 25 years at Vermont's Hartford High School.
