A man from Langley, B.C., is pleading that a heart-shaped pewter container filled with his deceased girlfriend's ashes be returned to him after it was stolen during a robbery on Thursday.
Thieves ransacked the home of Russ Moerman and took the urn along with thousands of dollars worth of goods, including electronics and Christmas presents. They also stole a necklace his girlfriend Amy often wore when she was alive.
"The thing that keeps going through my mind is I've lost her once and I just don't want to lose her again," Moerman told CTV News. "Having some of her ashes was a way for me to kind of hang onto her and keep her on some level, and she's been taken from me yet again."
Moerman was in a four-year, long-distance relationship with Amy, who died of a rare disease in April.
"She was the first person that made me realize what it's like to actually love somebody," he said. "I always knew I wanted to be with her no matter what hiccups came along."
He is now devastated by the theft of Amy's ashes and necklace and is hoping someone will return them to him. He doesn't care about why the robbery happened or need people with information to identify themselves; he just wants the personal items back.
"If somebody just told me to meet them at the corner of so-and-so and just handed me a box, and I walked away, that works for me," he said.
The heart-shaped pewter urn was stored in a box, is the size of a softball and has a star engraved in its right hand corner. The necklace is star-shaped, silver in colour and starting to tarnish.
If anyone has any information about the robbery or the whereabouts of the ashes and necklace please call Langley RCMP at 604 532-3200, or Moerman at 604 866-2683.
With a report from CTV British Columbia's Bhinder Sajan
