Roger Stettner just wants his wife’s ashes returned.
On June 6, his east-side Elgin home was burglarized while Stettner was out of town visiting one of his sons. The home has a burglar alarm and while the alarm was audibly sounding, the burglar — who had kicked in the front door — had little time before police would arrive.
The only thing missing from the home was the box containing Donna’s ashes.
Although the box clearly indicates it is a funerary box, police believe the burglar thought it may have been a jewelry box.
“I don’t know but I am guessing — they broke in, kicked the dead bolt and the frame in — and by the time they got into the bedroom, the audible alarm was going off. They grabbed the box and that is all they took. They didn’t do anything else,” Stettner said.
The custom-made box — created by a friend at Bethlehem Lutheran Church — included a plaque on the front, reading “In Loving Memory, Donna J. Stettner. Wife, Mother, Grandmother.” Her date of birth and date of death were also embossed on the plaque, adding “Dearly Missed But Never Forgotten.”
On the top of the box, a white wood cross is inlaid.
Nestled inside was another box from the funeral home with Donna’s ashes.
Police and neighbors have searched the area, looking to see if the box or the ashes had been dumped in the neighborhood. It is his biggest fear, Stettner said, that once the burglar realized there was no jewelry inside, he threw the box into the trash.
“She wouldn’t want that,” Stettner said of Donna.
The couple — high school sweethearts who attended Elgin High School — were married 53 years. “We did everything together,” Stettner said.
Donna Stettner had been sick much of her life, however. The couple had three children — two boys and a girl — and Donna stayed home with them when they were in school. After the children left home, she worked, too.
“She liked to stay busy, just like me,” he said.
But Donna’s health continued to deteriorate. Finally, they went to Minnesota’s Mayo Clinic. There, Donna was diagnosed with congenital heart disease — a trait many of the women in her family also had. After years of treatment for asthma because of her breathing problems, doctors finally figured out her heart issues in the late 1990s, Stettner said.
Surgeries — a pacemaker and even a surgery to remove an enlarged portion of her heart — followed.
“We did get her perking again. We brought her home from the nursing home in April. She was going pretty good. We finally had a caregiver for her,” in the family home.
But on a June Wednesday two years ago, Donna wasn’t feeling well and couldn’t get up. Stettner called the paramedics.
Donna had a hemorrhagic stroke. There was nothing doctors could do, in light of her already stressed heart, Stettner said. Donna died a few days later.
He wanted Donna cremated so that at the end of his own life, the couple could be buried in the same plot.
“They won’t put two caskets in the same plot, but they will put cremains in the same grave,” he said.
In some ways, the theft of Donna’s ashes has made him mourn her loss all over again, Stettner said. He’s attended grief support groups at Fox Valley Volunteer Hospice, which has helped. But his wish of being buried with her dies if the ashes are not found and returned.
He asks anyone who knows where the ashes are to either return them to their front porch, or drop them off at Bethlehem Lutheran Church, 340 Grand Blvd., near Lord’s Park. No questions will be asked, he said — he just wants Donna back.
Janelle Walker is a freelance reporter for The Courier-News.
