Ohio woman charged with stealing toys off a toddler’s grave

There’s heartless … and then there’s ‘stealing toys from a toddler’s grave’ heartless.

A woman in Ontario, Ohio was doing just that when cemetery surveillance cameras caught her red-handed.

The surveillance video shows the woman taking a toy duck off of a 14-month-old’s grave, which had been placed there by his parents just a few hours earlier.

For nearly two years, someone had been stealing mementos from the little boy's grave but police have been unable to identify the person who had been stealing them. On Saturday, they finally got a clear image of the woman and posted it to Facebook.

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According to Ontario police Detective Jon Sigler, some identified the woman as Frieda Kay Shade, 54, after thousands of comments were posted to the police Facebook page where the video of the grave robber was posted.

Hayden “Tank” Cole Sheridan was the name of the boy whose toys were being taken from his grave. The thefts started in 2007 after he died and was buried in a cemetery in a town next to Ontario. Sigler said the family felt targeted because mementos at other grave sites remained untouched, while their son’s were being stolen for years.

“When the family came to me, you could see the pain on their faces. It is such a sad story,” said Sigler in an interview. “It hit us the same way it hit everyone else, that this is crazy.”

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Because many had identified the woman as Shade, Sigler looked at her Facebook page and saw pictures of her wearing the same clothes as seen in the cemetery surveillance videos.

Shade turned herself in on Wednesday. She told police that the reason she took the toy was to keep it safe by placing on top of a garbage can because she saw an "aggressive dog" digging up flowers at the cemetery.

Shade is being charged with petty theft and is scheduled to appear in court next month.

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