Fergie's Tech Blog

29 June 2000: Vandals Break into the Tombs of Lynyrd Skynyrd's Ronnie Van Zant and Steve Gaines

Vandals broke into tombs containing the remains of Lynyrd Skynyrd singer Ronnie Van Zant and guitarist Steve Gaines early Thursday morning in Orange Park, Fla., about 12 miles south of Jacksonville, officials said.

"It doesn't appear that they actually took anything off the site, but some major damage was done," Clay County Sheriff's Department spokesperson Mary Justino said. "This goes way beyond fan worship or adoration. This is a criminal act that goes way beyond even a normal vandalism."

The private Jacksonville Memory Gardens cemetery stands beside a mall, where a man told police he had heard strange noises coming from the cemetery. Justino said that when police arrived on the scene around 3 a.m. Thursday, the two above-ground marble memorials had been smashed and broken into from behind. Van Zant's casket had been removed from its tomb but did not appear to have been opened. A plastic bag containing Gaines' ashes had been removed from a metal urn and had been torn, but only a tiny fraction — 1 percent, according to Justino — was spilled.

The gravesite is on the border of mall and cemetery property, an elaborate memorial of marble set off from the rest of the cemetery, with park benches, hedges and a large magnolia tree. The site also includes the grave of Cassie Gaines, Steve Gaines' sister, who was a backup singer with the band.

All three, along with personal manager Dean Kilpatrick, were killed when the band's plane crashed during a flight from Greenville, S.C., to Baton Rouge, La., in October 1977. Guitarists Gary Rossington and Allen Collins, keyboardist Billy Powell and bassist Leon Wilkeson survived the crash but were seriously injured. Collins died of pneumonia in 1990.

posted by Fergie @ 6/28/2006 10:01:00 PM