A Stevenson Ranch woman made an eerie find Monday when she stepped out of her house on Durant Place and found an engraved polished granite tombstone on her front lawn.
The bluish gray slab, left in gravel, was engraved with the words “Timothy Beatty – born in 1949 and died in 1996 – Loving husband of Alice.”
The resident, Donna Robert, immediately phoned the Santa Clarita Valley Sheriff’s Station to report the creepy discovery.
Robert told KCBS TV: “I’m like, that looks like a tombstone. The stone was shiny and I could see the word Timothy, and I didn’t look any more.”
A Durant Place neighbor who lives two doors down from the Robert house told The Signal Tuesday: “Sheriff’s deputies were here yesterday and took it away.”
Another resident walking his tiny dog on a leash along the cul-de-sac and in front of the Robert house described the incident as creepy.
“I would be a little freaked out if it happened on my lawn,” he said.
“But, I would be more upset if I were the family member of that tombstone person,” he said.
A search through marriage records revealed a couple of California marriages involving men named Timothy born in 1949 who married a woman named Alice, but no immediate sign of anyone named Beatty.
For “privacy reasons” deputies released only partial information of the engraved head stone, covering Timothy Beatty’s middle name for a photograph released by the sheriff’s station.
“It was found on a Stevenson Ranch cul-de-sac on the front lawn,” Lt. Igancio Somoano told the The Signal Monday.
“We have no idea what it is about,” he said.
Deputies tried in vain to find locate the origin of the tombstone.
“We’ve called all the cemeteries with no luck,” Sgt. Dan Peacock told The Signal Tuesday.
As of now, the incident remains a unsettling mystery.
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