NEW YORK – NOVEMBER 20: Funeral director Peter DeLuca, owner of Greenwich Village Funeral Home, holds a cremation urn in the showroom of his funeral parlor on November 20, 2008 in New York City. New technologies, such as flat screen televisions for video memorials, ornate and even sports-team themed cremation urns are also slowly being introduced at funeral homes. Despite the currently languishing economy, the funeral home world is readying for an upswing nationally, as the recession-resistant business prepares for an expected rise in death rates as baby boomers start to reach old age in the coming decade. (Photo by Chris Hondros/Getty Images)
A suburban Chicago couple whose house was ransacked this week is begging whomever made off with some belongings inside to return just one thing: The small white box containing the ashes of their infant son.
“It happened five years ago, but this brings it all up,” Sue LaDeur said of the 2014 death of her 10-day-old son, William “Billy” Pax LaDeur. “Now he has been stolen from us.”
The break-in happened sometime before LaDeur returned to her family’s Elmhurst home on Tuesday afternoon. Elmhurst police said in a news release that someone got into the home by breaking through a side window. The burglars or burglar, made off with some collector coins and grabbed the white square container from atop a dresser that could have been mistaken for a jewelry box.
The couple hopes that by sharing what happened, they will convince whomever broke into their home to look at the box closely, see the name of the crematorium that is on a label, and mail it there. Or, they say, the box could be dropped off at any funeral home or at any police or fire station.
The couple that planned to one day bury the remains of the boy want whomever took the box to know it is something that is of little value to anyone else but invaluable to the LaDeurs.
“He lives in our hearts,” Jim LaDeur, told the Chicago Tribune. “But this box is something that connects him with us... We just want to get this back.”
