Volunteers Help Clean Up Teen’s Destroyed Linwood Memorial

It's been a rough day for Donnah Marvel of Somers Point.

You saw in Joe Kelly's post from last night that Donnah's son's memorial on New Road in Linwood was brutally destroyed. According to multiple eyewitnesses, the vandalism was deliberate and violent. I was able to head out to the memorial site earlier this morning to chat with Donnah and a family friend in an attempt to find out more information about what exactly happened.

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After talking with Donnah about the incident, I discovered how she found out about it in the first place. Donnah says she was arriving home from a nice day of shopping when she received a phone call from a friend who witnessed the incident in real time. Donnah then rushed to the site to find it completely destroyed. The cross that had her son's name imprinted into it was chucked over 20 feet away from where it originally stood. It's important to note that this cross is about 3.5-4 feet tall and was embedded a foot or two into the ground. This means that the cross had to have been thrown with a good amount of force behind it.

While this incident is an awful one to be sure, it was so heartwarming to see all those who stopped by with flowers and trinkets for Nikk's memorial after hearing the news. Donnah told me once everyone had departed that she was so touched by the support she's been given thus far.

Anyone with any information regarding the incident is encouraged to reach out to the Linwood Police Department.

Check out the clean-up of Nikk's memorial from this morning: