Two Manchester boys who cannot be named because they are only 13, were given penalties for vandalizing a Jewish cemetery in Greater Manchester on Rochdale Old Road, Higher Blackley in June. The boys pushed over headstones which fell onto others and damaged them. The total cost of the damage is $24, 000, and residents were said to have been traumatized by the incident.
The court called the boys’ actions, “despicable, heartless and horrible, ” and although neither boy could tell the corrections officer why he perpetrated the act, the teens were said to have remorse. Anti-Semitic graffiti and swastikas were painted in another section of the cemetery, but there was no proof that the boys were responsible for the grafitti.
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Both boys have had restraining orders placed on them, and they are forbidden from entering any cemetery without an adult for an unspecified amount of time. One, who had a previous criminal record of assault, must wear an electronic tag and do reparation work for nine months. The other boy, who has no prior record, must pay (or his parents must pay) a fine of $816.
It was estimated that a hundred volunteers showed up at the Jewish cemetery to clean up the graffiti and repair the damage after the incident.
