SOUTH FULTON, Ga. — Dozens of tires are strewn among headstones in the cemetery at a small church in South Fulton.
Channel 2’s Michael Doudna went to Pleasant Hill Victory AME Church on Friday where there were piles of tires stacked several feet high.
Pastor Lola Russell said that under one particularly large pile lies four or five graves.
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"If can’t trust that they’re going to be at peace in a cemetery, what can I trust?" Russell asked.
Congregation members say the tires only started appearing earlier this week, and they don’t understand how someone can disrespect these final resting places.
“Our ancestors, whether they are related to us or others, are still on these grounds," Russell said.
The building on Stonewall Tell Road has been a church site for nearly 100 years. Before that, the building was a one-room schoolhouse for Black students dating back to the 1910s.
But Russell says this graveyard full of history has been turned into a dumping ground.
“We as a people, we’ve got to be better than this,” she said.
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The small congregation says they do not know who did it, but the cost of clean-up now falls on them.
“Now it’s going to cost someone else because of what you did,” Russell said.
She says they are trying to figure out the next steps and are praying for grace, but she has a message for those who left the tires behind.
“Did you think about your own life, your own family member, your mother, your grandfather, whoever you may have lost in your family, and the same thing being done to them?” she said.
If the person who tossed the tires is caught, they could be required to pay for the removal, face fines and possibly jail time. If not, it will be the congregation’s responsibility.
They have started a GoFundMe campaign to raise money to remove the tires and restore the cemetery.
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