Even the dead can't escape the ineptitude of the city's Sanitation Department.

Sanitation crews dumped tons of dirty snow from the Christmas-weekend blizzard into the city's biggest Jewish cemetery, toppling 21 gravestones and wrecking an iron fence.

"It's jarring, and it's an emotional thing," said Yana Zhuravel, a Brooklyn lawyer whose grandparents' headstones at Washington Cemetery in Midwood, Brooklyn, were among those knocked over.

"Clearly, nobody came with the intention of doing this, I'm sure," said Zhuravel. "But when an accident happens of this caliber, you expect some form of accountability."

"We were devastated," said cemetery manager Marisa Tarantino.

Workers believe the snow was dumped sometime over the New Year's holiday, Tarantino said.

The cemetery is closed on Saturday. Workers noticed the knocked-over gravestones when the cemetery opened at 8 a.m. Sunday, Tarantino said.

Sanitation officials sent an employee to look into the matter, and the cemetery plans to file a claim with the city. Some people who heard of the devastation stopped by the cemetery yesterday to check on their relatives' graves.

"Ours is good," said Oscar Daych, 76, whose mother-in-law is buried there. "But this is unbelievable. It's terrible. We don't know what to say."

The snow-clearing crews also buried several vehicles parked next to the cemetery on Bay Parkway.

Miguel Mena's smashed car looked as if a bomb had hit it.

Mena, of Corona, Queens, is a butcher in the neighborhood and says he left his car parked on the other side of the street when the storm hit.

He figures the city towed the 1995 Nissan Altima to its spot next to the cemetery, where city trucks then dumped snow on it.

"It's been difficult for me," Mena said. "It takes an hour and a half for me to get to work."

Said his brother, Jenndy Mena: "Bloomberg said not to drive. Just leave your car in the street."

Mario Roca, a Borough Park moving man, said he parked his 14-foot truck several hundred feet from the snow pile on Christmas Day.

By New Year's Day, he said, the vehicle had been moved to a new spot next to the toppled headstones -- and "buried underneath mountains of snow."

The dirty snow was piled so high, Roca couldn't even see his truck until he climbed on top of it.

"This is my only box truck," Roca said. "It's basically ruined my business."

Department of Sanitation spokesman Keith Mellis said the city would provide paperwork allowing the motorists and the cemetery to file damage claims.


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