Twisted Plot: Did Cemetery Workers Dump Bodies to Resell Gravesites?

ALSIP, Illinois (CBS/AP) More than 100 bodies that were supposed to rest in peace at a historic suburban Chicago cemetery may have been dug up instead, and dumped into a mass grave -- in a scheme by employees to profit by reselling the burial plots.

Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart said Wednesday that his office was questioning five employees of Burr Oak Cemetery in Alsip, Ill. The workers are accused of conducting off-the-book burials and pocketing the cash.

Dart says the workers allegedly dumped bodies, and some caskets, in an unused rear area of the 150-acre cemetery. He says the scam may have been going on for about four years.

Dart says his office began investigating six weeks ago when the cemetery owner reported one employee began feeling guilty and revealed what allegedly was going on.

No charges have been filed.

According to the Chicago Tribune, Prominent African Americans including civil rights icon and lynching victim Emmett Till, and blues musicians Willie Nixon and Dinah Washington, are buried at Burr Oak Cemetery.

Video Courtesy Of CBS Affiliate CBS 2 Chicago