Woodcock Hill Cemetery: Bodies buried over Covid victims days after funerals

The families of two men who died with Covid were distraught to discover bodies had been buried on top of their loved ones days after their funerals.

Relatives of Basheer Meghjee said they only found out another person had been placed in his grave in Rickmansworth, Hertfordshire, through rumours.

The family, who informed another that the same may have happened to them, added they had been left "in pieces".

The cemetery's leaseholders said the family agreed to the two-tier burial.

Mr Meghjee, who lived in Stanmore, north-west London, died last year at the age of 76.

He was buried in the Muslim section of Woodcock Hill Cemetery on 27 March, but 12 days later the grave was opened up and an unrelated person was placed above him in the same plot.

His family said they were not informed that it had happened and only found out through "community whispers".

Mr Meghjee's nephew Monty said they initially "just didn't believe it" but it was confirmed three weeks later "and the family were absolutely horrified".

Abbas Meghjee, Basheer Meghjee's son, said they had been left "in pieces".

"My mum especially comes every week to the graveyard and every week we have the same conversation as we're leaving as to why it happened," he said.

Upon visiting the grave in April last year, the family became suspicious that the same thing may have happened in the plot next to their father's, where Mustafa Ibrahim had been buried, and so they left a note.

It was discovered by Mr Ibrahim's daughter Yugel who said she also did not know that her father's grave had been opened and contained a second body.

"I felt sick. I couldn't come to the grave. I still struggle to come to the grave," she said.

"I find it hard coming to my dad's grave knowing, with no disrespect, there's another man on top of him."

Despite both families having their loved ones placed in double graves, there are numerous empty plots which are not in use at the site.

Woodcock Hill Cemetery includes both a Christian and a Muslim section.

The site is administered by Three Rivers District Council but the Muslim section is leased and looked after by BW Foundation, the charitable arm of the Salaam Centre based in Harrow.

The foundation introduced a new two-tier burial policy on 16 March last year in response to an expected rise in demand for graves because of Covid, which families had to agree to.

The double burial policy was ended in August 2020 after it became clear demand for graves was not as high as expected.

The Meghjee family launched legal proceedings in the summer to exhume the other body and stop the two-tier system, claiming that the policy was not clear and they had believed it would only be applied if plot spaces ran out.

However, a High Court judge ruled against them saying they had signed the document and the BW Foundation had acted "properly and with sensitivity throughout".

BW Foundation said it had "entered in dialogue with an Islamic jurisprudential" to ensure acceptability of multi-tier graves for Muslim burials and the charity had taken "extra care in advising family members and the local mosque of this change".

It added that it had received "several complaints" over the past year that two-tier burials had been carried out without families' consent, but said it had "documented evidence... to prove that the accusations are baseless".

By Tom Edwards, BBC London correspondent

Woodcock Hill Cemetery is a peaceful place. There is birdsong from the surrounding tall trees.

It looks like many other cemeteries but here, if you look closely, at two graves there are differences on the name plaques.

Here, different people from different families are buried in the same plot.

The two-tier grave policy was brought in as the charity and leaseholder BW Foundation was expecting more burials during the pandemic.

The families feel wronged. They have tried getting an injunction in the courts, but to no avail.

The judge ruled they had been told of the two-tier grave policy in writing.

The families say they were grieving, and their faith meant they had to get their loved ones buried quickly. They say they wouldn't have signed anything to agree to double burials if they had known.

They say they won't give up their fight for an apology and resolution and say they are caught in a nightmare.

Their hopes lie now with the Local Government Ombudsman.