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Grave Injustice: Police Bust Man For Cemetery Scam

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Aug 9, 2007 8:51 pm US/Eastern

Grave Injustice: Police Bust Man For Cemetery Scam

HAWTHORNE, N.Y. (AP) ―

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The owner of a headstone company across the street from a cemetery called the Gate of Heaven took thousands of dollars from customers who ordered monuments but didn't install them at the graves, police said.

Pasquale Fasolino was arrested Thursday on charges he cheated at least 10 customers out of a total of $22,000, said Mount Pleasant police, who were asking other customers to go to the cemetery to make sure their loved ones' headstones had been put in. The cemetery, about 20 miles north of New York, is where baseball slugger Babe Ruth and actor James Cagney are buried.

Fasolino, who took over running Fasolino Monuments after his father died, installed headstones at cemeteries throughout Westchester and Putnam counties. He cheated several customers, police said, by promising to erect headstones within 90 days but not doing so after more than a year or two in some cases and then closing his business a few months ago.

Fasolino, of Queens, was charged with 10 counts of scheme to defraud. He was released after posting $5,000 bond and was told to return to court Aug. 23.

There was no telephone listing in Queens for Fasolino, and police said they believed he didn't have a lawyer.

But Fasolino's mother, Theresa Fasolino, reached by telephone at the Queens home where he used to live, said she was surprised by the allegations against him.

"He was not that type of a person," she said.