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Louisiana cemetery changes contract after Black deputy denied burial
Source: Associated Press
Cemetery changes contract after Black deputy denied burial
By JANET McCONNAUGHEY
January 29, 2021
The board of a small Louisiana cemetery that denied burial to a Black sheriff’s deputy held an emergency meeting Thursday and removed a whites-only provision from its sales contracts.
“When that meeting was over it was like a weight lifted off of me,” H. Creig Vizena, board president for Oaklin Springs Cemetery in southwest Louisiana, said Thursday night.
He said he was stunned and ashamed to learn two days earlier that the family of Allen Parish Sheriff’s Deputy Darrell Semien, who died Sunday, had been told that he could not be buried at the cemetery near Oberlin because he was African American.
“It’s horrible,” Vizena told The Associated Press on Thursday morning. He said the board members removed the word “white” from a contract stipulation conveying “the right of burial of the remains of white human beings.”
-snip-
By JANET McCONNAUGHEY
January 29, 2021
The board of a small Louisiana cemetery that denied burial to a Black sheriff’s deputy held an emergency meeting Thursday and removed a whites-only provision from its sales contracts.
“When that meeting was over it was like a weight lifted off of me,” H. Creig Vizena, board president for Oaklin Springs Cemetery in southwest Louisiana, said Thursday night.
He said he was stunned and ashamed to learn two days earlier that the family of Allen Parish Sheriff’s Deputy Darrell Semien, who died Sunday, had been told that he could not be buried at the cemetery near Oberlin because he was African American.
“It’s horrible,” Vizena told The Associated Press on Thursday morning. He said the board members removed the word “white” from a contract stipulation conveying “the right of burial of the remains of white human beings.”
-snip-
Read more: https://apnews.com/article/race-and-ethnicity-louisiana-1bc5dd398b17fc70d69062a3b05bd508
______________________________________________________________________
Source: The Guardian and agencies
Louisiana cemetery told family of Black deputy he couldn't be buried due to 'whites only' policy
Oaklin Springs cemetery’s board has since voted to remove the whites-only provision from its sales contracts
Guardian staff and agencies
Fri 29 Jan 2021 02.59 GMT
The family of a Black sheriff’s deputy in Louisiana said a local cemetery declined to bury his body after he died last week due to a “whites only” policy.
Darrell Semien, an Allen Parish sheriff’s office deputy, died on Sunday at the age of 55. But when his widow Karla went to inquire about his burial at the local Oaklin Springs cemetery, the Semien family said, she was told he couldn’t be buried there.
“I just went to Oaklin Springs cemetery to pick a plot for my husband to be buried . I met with the lady out there and she said she could not sell me a plot because the cemetery is a whites only cemetery,” Semien wrote in a Facebook post on Tuesday. “Wow what a slap in the face.”
Oaklin Springs cemetery confirmed to local station KPLC on Wednesday that a contract from the 1950s mentions “the right of burial of the remains of white human beings”.
The cemetery is located in Allen Parish, Louisiana – where nearly a quarter of residents are Black.
-snip-
Oaklin Springs cemetery’s board has since voted to remove the whites-only provision from its sales contracts
Guardian staff and agencies
Fri 29 Jan 2021 02.59 GMT
The family of a Black sheriff’s deputy in Louisiana said a local cemetery declined to bury his body after he died last week due to a “whites only” policy.
Darrell Semien, an Allen Parish sheriff’s office deputy, died on Sunday at the age of 55. But when his widow Karla went to inquire about his burial at the local Oaklin Springs cemetery, the Semien family said, she was told he couldn’t be buried there.
“I just went to Oaklin Springs cemetery to pick a plot for my husband to be buried . I met with the lady out there and she said she could not sell me a plot because the cemetery is a whites only cemetery,” Semien wrote in a Facebook post on Tuesday. “Wow what a slap in the face.”
Oaklin Springs cemetery confirmed to local station KPLC on Wednesday that a contract from the 1950s mentions “the right of burial of the remains of white human beings”.
The cemetery is located in Allen Parish, Louisiana – where nearly a quarter of residents are Black.
-snip-
Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/jan/28/lousiana-oaklin-springs-cemetery-whites-only-policy
