Botched theft: Urn containing Freud’s ashes broken

A thief who tried to steal it from a London crematorium dropped it while trying to climb over gate, say police.

LONDON: A thief who tried to steal an ancient urn containing the ashes of Sigmund Freud, the founder of psychoanalysis, from a London crematorium dropped it while trying to climb over a gate, police said Friday. The burglar, who may have had an accomplice, forced a window at the Golders Green Crematorium on New Year’s Eve, took the 4th-century BC urn from its plinth and left the building by the same means. “The suspect(s) attempted to leave the venue by climbing over a locked gate, in doing so they dropped the urn causing the damage,” the Metropolitan Police said in statement. It said the urn was left “severely damaged”.

Published in The Express Tribune, January 19^th, 2014.