FRESNO, Calif. ( KSEE/KGPE ) – A 19-year-old Fresno woman has branded the city’s police department as unreliable after two calls were needed to get officers to respond to the theft of her mother’s ashes.
Naziriee Gumbs’ mother passed away in 2022; she describes the theft of her mother’s ashes as forcing her to relive the trauma of losing her mother all over again.
Gumbs had moved her mother’s ashes out of storage, along with her mother’s purse and other belongings, while she was searching for a new place to live. Gumbs says she was looking at apartments on Monday evening, in the area of Gregory Avenue and West Ashlan Avenue, when her grandmother noticed that her car had been broken into. The thieves had taken two purses and inside one of them were Naziree Gumb’s mother’s ashes. They immediately called Fresno Police.
“We did not hear back from them the entire night,” Gumbs said. “My grandma had to call again for them to come. That goes to show the police were not reliable.”
In the time it took for police to respond, Gumbs and her family had managed to find security camera footage of the getaway vehicle the perpetrators used. The footage shows a black vehicle driving away from the scene – with a distinct off-white panel on the right side of the vehicle.