Grave of Crashdïet founder Dave Lepard vandalised

The grave of Crashdïet founder Dave Lepard (born David Roberto Hellman, on the gravestone referred to as David Lepard Hellman), who died by suicide in January 2006, was vandalised during the night from Monday to Tuesday (22-23 July 2024). Since 19 other graves were vandalised as well, it currently looks as if the choice of the desecrated graves was more a matter of chance than of a planned selection. It is also unclear whether there were one or more perpetrators and what the motive might have been. The graves in question are located in the cemetery “Uppsala gamla kyrkogård”, in the Swedish city of Uppsala. The church has reported the incidents to the police. The desecrated graves were discovered on Tuesday morning when the cemetery keepers arrived at “Uppsala gamla kyrkogård”. The damage includes twenty overturned gravestones, broken grave lanterns and destroyed flower arrangements. In an interview with Sweden’s national public broadcaster SVT, Peter Berglund, cemetery manager of the pastorate in Uppsala, says that it “looks like someone has gone berserk here”, “there must have been a lot of anger” and that “it is very unusual for something like this to happen, and one is saddened”. Something similar has not happened in the cemetery for around ten years. When asked about increased security measures, Peter Berglund says that camera surveillance would be difficult in this case because the cemetery is a protected place.

Dave Lepard was the founder and frontman of the Swedish glam sleaze rock band Crashdïet. The band was founded in 2000 and featured, amongst others, guitarist Mary Goore, nowadays better known as Ghost frontman Tobias Forge. Two, three years after Crashdïet was founded, Dave Lepard changed the band’s line-up. From this second line-up, bass player Peter London and guitarist Martin Sweet are still active in the band. In 2005, Crashdïet achieved their breakthrough with the release of their debut album “Rest In Sleaze”. Tragically, Dave Lepard died the following year in his hometown of Uppsala, aged 25. Since then, his position as frontman of the band has been replaced four times: First by H. Olliver Twisted (a.k.a. Olli Herman, frontman of the Finnish merry metallers Reckless Love and the Finnish rock band Popeda), then by Simon Cruz, then by Gabriel Keyes and currently by John Elliot (frontman of the Swedish hard rock band Confess).

Below, you can check out the music video for Crashdïet‘s first single release and breakthrough hit “Riot In Everyone“: