MOUNT DORA -- Two Polk County men, a former police officer and a convicted felon, are facing charges after Lake County deputies say they desecrated five graves in a cemetery, four of which contained the remains of military veterans.
Lake County detectives say the desecration occurred at the Edgewood Cemetery, a historically African-American cemetery, December 6th. Crime scene investigators collected various items left at the gravesites, including cigars, and collected DNA. This led them to Brian Tolentino, 43, of Davenport. He pointed them to Juan Lopez of Lake Wales. They say Lopez told them the men opened the graves and removed the skulls of five people in a religious ritual.
Lopez reportedly told detectives they were followers of the Palo Mayombe religion, which Sheriff Grady Judd described as the "dark side" of the Santeria religion. Detectives say Lopez told them spirits directed them to the cemetery and to look for "heroes" to take body parts for their ritual. Lopez reportedly told them the cigars and DNA were used to keep the spirits from entering Tolentino and himself as they exhumed the corpses.
Both men had lived in Puerto Rico. Lopez had been a police officer there and currently runs a karate school on Dundee Road in Winter Haven. Tolentino has a criminal record from the island for bank robbery as well as cocaine and grand theft charges in Orange County, which were dropped.
Sheriff Judd says the four identified victims include a Marine veteran, and two Army veterans from World War Two and Korea, as well as a woman who was a caregiver. Judd said they targeted veterans because they believed their spirits were stronger.
Detectives found five skulls identified as human and hope to identify the fifth.
Judd says Lopez described cemeteries as "holy sites" and "shopping centers" and said he had a hard time finding body parts "in the States."
"We don't have any skulls lying around in the county jail, and that's where he's going," Judd said.
Photo: PCSO via News Channel 8