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'They're just the scum of the earth': Woman says markers stolen from family gravesite


Doris Summers says someone stole two stone markers from a family gravesite in Gates. The Marion County Sheriff's Office says a person of interest was caught on camera nearby. (Surveillance photo courtesy Doris Summers.){ }
Doris Summers says someone stole two stone markers from a family gravesite in Gates. The Marion County Sheriff's Office says a person of interest was caught on camera nearby. (Surveillance photo courtesy Doris Summers.)
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Doris Summers, of Sublimity, is furious and heartbroken after she says someone stole stone markers from a private family gravesite.

The Marion County Sheriff's Office is looking for a person of interest who was caught on camera nearby.

"I would just love to beat the crap out of him and then turn him over to my kids," Summers told a KATU reporter Wednesday.

She and her husband, Steven Summers, have owned a special site in the woods in east Marion County for more than two decades. It has a travel trailer and 10 acres of forest. The site is located in the town of Gates about 40 miles east of Salem.

"It's just a place to go for peace and it's quiet," said Doris. "Our children use it. Our grandchildren use it."

On the site is a private graveyard commemorating three beloved members of Doris and Steven's family.

"My mother, my father and my grandson," Doris explained. "It's just a beautiful place for them to lay to rest."

The gravesite isn't easy to find. To get to it you have to walk about 150 yards through brush from Gates Hill Road Southeast.

But Doris said they recently found out someone stole two markers, one commemorating her grandson who died at birth more than 20 years ago, and another memorializing Doris's mother. She passed away in 2012.

"Their ashes are buried there," Doris said. "Hers hit me hard. I don't know why anybody would do that."

The marker for her mother is a quartz-type stone and the one for her grandson is a piece of petrified wood, which her son found at the bottom of a river. The names of both family members are carved on a wooden bench nearby. The marker for Doris's father, a traditional bronze gravestone engraved with his name and other information, is still embedded in the ground.

"It's obviously a grave site," Doris explained.

She said a trail camera that Steven set up captured a photo of a man on the property at around 6:30 a.m. on April 23. That's when she believes the markers were stolen.

They made the discovery over Memorial Day weekend.

"My heart sunk," Doris said. "We just walked away. We left. We were going to do other things, but we just left."

A spokesman for the Marion County Sheriff's Office said the man in the picture is considered a person of interest in the case.

"My children are furious. I hope my son doesn't find him. ...They're just the scum of the earth," Doris said. "I love my mother. She did everything for her kids. Her kids were her world and her grandkids."

The sheriff's office said at this point they don't know who committed the crime. If you have any helpful information, you're asked to call (503) 588-5032.

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