South Sound News

Family says monument to slain man damaged, wants cemetery to pay

LACEY, Wash. — This is not how Vicky Jordan imagined the grave of her only son would look.  She and her family wanted a monument to capture his kind, loving spirit.

"And we worked on this for months together until we found something that was perfect for Danny," Jordan said.

>>"He's not just any family member after all," they were asked.<<

"He's our older brother," said Shannon Beattie, his sister. "A great friend, an example."

"It's a beautiful memorial," said Tony Ward, of Lasting Touch Memorials - who created the monument.  He says he brought it to Woodlawn Cemetery and a cemetery worker told him where to put it.

"He showed me by doing this and this is where I put it," Ward said.

Ward was asked: "You didn't know where it belonged except that he told you where to put it?"

"And he put his feet out like this and pointed straight it down," Ward said.

But this is someone else's grave.  And the person who expects to rest there someday ordered the cemetery to move it.

But no one told Guerin's family.

"And so the next morning?" Vicky Jordan was asked.

"Yeah, I come out here and it was all dismantled," she said.

It was chipped in several places.

"No honor, no respect whatsover," Jordan said. "And not a word to us."

The family was asked if it felt it was treated well.

"No," said Robert Guerin, the victim's father. "I was in Yakima at the time when she called me. Yeah, and I was furious."

The cemetery says Tony didn't reinforce the monument properly. But he says whoever moved it is to blame.

"Something happened to it while it was up in the air and fell and broke," Ward said.

Now it is Vicky Jordan's heart that is broken, again.

"This is real damaging to the heart," she said. "You cannot 'super glue' this back together.  The murder was more than enough, more than enough."

Ward says the monument is beyond repair.

Daniel's mother says the cemetery should offer them compensation for this.

Any money, she says, would be used for a reward.   After all, her son's killer has never been caught.  She is hoping a big reward might get someone who knows something to come forward.