Council blasted over plan to cut teenager's grave in half

A mother vowed yesterday to sleep by her daughter’s grave — to stop it being cut in half.

Grieving Lily Pinnock has been told the 6ft long plot marking teenager Angelene’s resting place breaks health and safety rules.

Officials say graves should be only 3ft long and have warned Angelene’s family to shorten hers — or else contractors will do it for them.



Angelene died at 15 in 2007 after a two-year battle with leukaemia and was buried in the cemetery at Pitsea Crematorium in Essex.

Her immaculately tended plot is covered with an ornate marble surround and ornaments which Lily, 53, her husband Jeffrey, 52, and Angelene’s brother and sister Jeff and Dolly lovingly visit every day.

But now Basildon Council is enforcing a rule that graves ought to be just 3ft long to leave access for the elderly and disabled between headstone rows. Lily, of Bowers Gifford, said: “They are not cutting my daughter in half. I will sleep in the cemetery if I have to but they are not touching her grave.”