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Bizarre Custody Fight: Baby's body taken from grave

Posted at 6:36 AM, Jan 08, 2019
and last updated 2019-01-08 07:36:52-05

(WFIE) A mother in Georgia says her child's body was exhumed without her permission by her ex-husband and taken to Hawesville, Kentucky.

It all started on December 21 when the body of Wesley Newton was exhumed from his grave in Macon, Georgia.

When Carin Manusuthakis learned that her son's body had been taken from its grave, she says she could not believe it.

Wesley had been buried in Macon for 27 years. He had passed away shortly after birth.

"Why would anyone do this? This child has been buried for 27 years, resting peacefully in a cemetery buried with other family members," Manusuthakis says.

Kentucky State Police say the child's father, Steven Newton, had the body exhumed and picked it up from a funeral home on December 21 and brought to Hawesville, where it was kept in the garage of local magistrate L.T. Newton, the child's grandfather.

"This is unchartered for us," says Corey King of the Kentucky State Police. "Eighteen years of working in service work like this, I have never experienced a complaint or call like this."

Manusuthakis says she believes the permits to obtain the body may have been fraudulent.