Worcester Police Chief Appeals For Help To End Bombing Suspect Burial Dilemma

WORCESTER (CBS) – Worcester's police chief made a public appeal Wednesday for someone to come forward with a burial plot for one of the Boston Marathon bombings suspects.

Tamerlan Tsarnaev's body has been at the Graham Putnam and Mahoney Funeral Home in Worcester since May 3.

WBZ NewsRadio 1030's Lana Jones reports

Since then, funeral home director Peter Stefan has been unable to locate a single cemetery willing to take Tsarnaev's body.

Some sites have been offered and then withdrawn for fear of negative publicity.

"On Monday there was a proposed offer for a burial site at a Department of Correction facility that evaporated on Tuesday," Police Chief Gary Gemme told reporters Wednesday.

The DOC now says they never offered a location for the body to be buried. In a statement Wednesday they said, "DOC's burial facilities have been reserved for the bodies of inmates who pass away while in state custody."

With "no immediate prospects" for a burial plot and police overtime costs for providing security running at approximately $10,000 a day, Gemme said his department is forced "into the unwanted position of having to assist the family with locating a burial site."

"We need a solution," he said, adding that sending the body back to Russia is "not an option" with Tsarnaev's uncle who has claimed the body.

"There is a need to do the right thing, we are not barbarians. We bury the dead, so I am publicly appealing to those with authority to provide a burial site, do so, and to do so quickly."