A North Vancouver woman says she’s bereft after thieves ransacked her home and stole irreplaceable heirloom jewelry as well as her mother’s ashes on Tuesday.
Denise Fergusson, 65, returned to her Tempe Heights home just north of Highway 1 Tuesday afternoon, soon noting her door was “slightly” ajar.
After seeing telltale signs someone had been in her home, Fergusson fled.
“I ran out of the house and I went to one of our neighbours and I said, ‘There’s something not right in our house.’”
Upon returning with a neighbour, she found her locked drawers had been forced open and ransacked.
The thief took a white gold and diamond Piaget watch, South African gold coins called Krugerrands which were given to Fergusson to commemorate the birth of her children. A pearl necklace, a bracelet Fergusson’s father bought when she was born as well as gold medals her husband’s grandfather won in horse races were also stolen.
“They probably will be put on a scale and weighed and somebody will get cash for it for who knows what,” she said.
But Fergusson said she felt ill when she realized thieves had also lifted something even more precious - the jewelry box containing her mother’s ashes.
“I actually feel sick about it.”
She was “extremely close” with her mother, who died four years ago, Fergusson said.
“(It’s) such a violation and just so brazen.”
Ferguson has reported the theft to the RCMP and still hopes she might get back some of what was stolen – particularly the ashes.
The jewelry box that contained her mother’s ashes was between eight and 10 inches long, four inches wide and approximately three inches high. It had fish painted in blue and orange as well as a bit of mother-of-pearl inlay. The bag containing her mother’s ashes was black and tied with a metallic ribbon.
