ROANOKE TIMES 
                      Copyright (c) 1997, Roanoke Times

DATE: Friday, January 3, 1997                TAG: 9701030095
SECTION: VIRGINIA                 PAGE: B-4  EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY 
DATELINE: NEWPORT NEWS
SOURCE: ASSOCIATED PRESS
MEMO: NOTE: Shorter version ran in Metro edition.

FAMILY SAYS ELMO STOLEN FROM GRAVE

Shannon Arbetello put a Tickle Me Elmo and other dolls on the grave marker of her 2-year-old son last summer. When she went back in December, Elmo was gone.

Arbetello thinks it was stolen, because the other dolls were still there. The furry, red Elmo giggles and was the must-have toy this holiday season, becoming scarce in stores and selling on the street for hundreds of dollars each.

``Someone was so concerned about getting their kid a Tickle Me Elmo that they had to steal it from a grave,'' said Arbetello, 29. ``There are so many other toys; why?

``Nicholas had already been through so much. For someone to take this was awful.''

Nicholas was born eight weeks premature. He had only one working kidney and had spent much of his short life in the hospital. In June, two weeks after doctors removed a body cast meant to correct a hip problem, Nicholas wandered into a tub and drowned.

Arbetello had run the bath for her two other children, 7 and 4. She had closed the bathroom door when she went to get them, but Nicholas somehow managed to get into the room.

Nicholas had loved the ``Sesame Street'' character Elmo so much that he had an army of Elmo dolls scattered around the house. His mother buried two of the dolls with him.

When Tickle Me Elmo appeared on toy store shelves in August, Arbetello thought that Nicholas would have wanted one. No one knew then how popular the toy would become.

After hearing about the missing doll, a woman offered to give Arbetello a Tickle Me Elmo she had bought for her granddaughter. Arbetello turned her down.

``I told her I wanted her granddaughter to have it,'' she said. ``That gave me a little hope that all people aren't bad.''

LENGTH: Short :   49 lines
ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO:  AP. Shannon Arbetello and her children Anthony, 4, and 
          Ashley, 7, visit the grave of her son, Nicholas, whose Tickle Me 
          Elmo doll disappeared before Christmas.