A total stranger has offered to replace the headstone of a baby girl's grave after the mother of the child says the grave marker went missing.
Tiffany Cribbs’ 5-month-old, Tiffanique Slaton, would be 11 years old, she says. Her baby daughter died in 2006. She recently went to the burial site at Mount Hope Cemetery on what would have been Tiffanique’s birthday—but says she couldn’t find the headstone.
“From lot 36, to 35 to lot 29, I paced back and forth through the sections from front to back,” an emotional Cribbs said. “[I] couldn’t find baby’s gravesite anywhere.”
The cemetery told NBC 5 records for the infant show a stone was never placed. It also said if the stone didn’t meet certain requirements it could have been removed, or—what Cribbs feared most—stolen.
Desperate to find answers, Cribbs reached out to the Dempsey Burdick Foundation, which donated the headstone to her family to cover the costs. The founder told her there was little he could do since the foundation has shutdown, she said.
After the cemetery was unable to provide Cribbs with answer, the general manager of Memorial Park Cemetery in Skokie stepped up and offered to replace Tiffanique's marker.
A statement from the cemetery’s manager, Gill Giddens, reads:
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“I spoke with Tiffany earlier this afternoon. Memorial Park and all of our Dignity Memorial locations are honored to help her. I will personally be meeting with her on Tuesday and we will take good care of her.”
Cribbs says she is eternally grateful.
"Words can't explain how I feel right now," she told NBC 5. "My smile is shiny."
She said she will be visiting her daughter's final resting place in Mount Hope Cemetery on Monday on what would have been Tiffanique's 11th birthday.
She says she will release balloons with family members.
