NEW YORK (1010 WINS/WCBS 880) -- The human hand found by a dog walker at a Staten Island forest last week belonged to a woman who was buried about a mile away more than a decade ago, police said.
The shocking find was made Thursday afternoon at Amboy and Cunningham roads in Pleasant Plains as a man walked his dog near the entrance to North Mount Loretto State Forest, a 200-acre wooded area on the South Shore.
The medical examiner determined over the weekend that the hand is that of a 63-year-old woman buried in a wooden coffin in 2011 at Resurrection Cemetery in Pleasant Plains, police said.
The unidentified woman’s hand was likely severed on Feb. 27, when the plot adjacent to hers was excavated for a reburial, according to officials.
Soil from the excavation was reportedly dumped at a nearby tree line, though it’s unclear how the hand traveled more than a mile away to the forest.
The cemetery told the Staten Island Advance that the remains will be “respectfully reinterred.”
“While at this point we do not know what transpired, we take this matter with great seriousness and will conduct an investigation, as well as cooperate in any investigation that civil authorities might undertake,” the cemetery said, adding that “we extend to the affected family our deep and prayerful regret for the sorrow that this has undoubtedly caused them.”
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