JONESBORO, Ga. — A family says a U.S. Air Force veteran was buried in the wrong plot of land in a Jonesboro city cemetery -- and now they're struggling to get him in his final resting place.
Some upturned red clay soil and a decayed floral arrangement mark the burial spot of Bob Brown. He died in August at age 87.
Weeks later, his widow Ann Brown learned his rightful burial spot in Jonesboro’s city cemetery was supposed to be about a hundred feet north.
"He’s buried in the wrong Brown area and I can’t get the city to make the correction," Ann Brown said Tuesday.
The City of Jonesboro runs the historic cemetery. Brown's family members contacted city officials to get the veteran's body moved out of the incorrect spot and into the nearby burial plot he had acquired years ago.
In the months since then, "nothing. Silence. Crickets," said Kevin Mooney, Brown's son-in-law.
"Certainly somebody made a mistake, whether it was the city or the funeral home. The Brown family doesn’t really care who made the mistake or how it happened -- they just want it remedied," Mooney said, who is also an attorney.
There are numerous graves in the city cemetery with the name Brown on them. Family members said some pink flags appeared nearby in recent weeks, possibly to mark a new site for the misplaced grave.
"It appears the pink flags have gone in yet another wrong spot," Mooney said.
Ann Brown says her late husband would have gotten a good laugh out of his mislocated grave site.
"He had a sense of humor that would not stop," she said.
But not her.
She said the unwillingness of the city to address the issue has added to her grief and headaches dealing with her late husband's estate.
Officials in the Jonesboro city manager’s office didn’t respond to 11Alive's repeated requests for comment.