Guy's Obama Tombstone Raises Halloween Ruckus

Neighbors squabble over 'disrespectful' gravestone with president's name
By Matt Cantor,  Newser Staff
Posted Oct 15, 2014 8:34 AM CDT
Guy's Obama Tombstone Raises a Halloween Ruckus
A tombstone with President Obama's name on it has caused controversy in Oklahoma.   (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)

A neighborhood feud has become national news: After a man in Edmond, Okla., put up a tombstone for President Obama in his yard, a woman complained to a local station. "Regardless of your political views … he is the president of the United States," Jamilla Phillips says, as per ABC News. "I just think it was disrespectful." But Dwayne Dockens, the owner of the display, says Phillips should have come to him rather than gone to the news; now he's more determined to keep the stone in place. "This could have been settled over an afternoon talk," he says.

Dockens and his family have been showing the tombstone for three years, they say, and no one has previously raised issues with it. The grave says Obama's name, with a question mark in place of a birthdate. The family made the stone "a few years ago back when it was a big deal, questions up about [Obama's] birth certificate," he tells KOCO. The item is part of a larger display featuring tombstones with labels like "Imma Gonner Now" and "I told you I was sick," the Daily Mail reports. "I certainly didn't mean to offend anybody or cause any problems. Don't know that I would take it down," Dockens says. (In other questionable Halloween moves, expect to see lots of Ebola costumes this year.)

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