Inmate road crew finds body in Durham County

Durham, N.C. — A state inmate road crew found a body in northern Durham County Wednesday morning, authorities said.

The inmates were cleaning up roadside litter along Old Oxford Road about a mile north of Snow Hill Road at about 9:45 a.m. when they spotted a large plastic bag, said Steve Abbott, spokesman for the Department of Transportation. Thinking it was an animal, they tried to collect it but found human remains inside the bag, he said.

Lt. Stan Harris with the Durham County Sheriff's Office said the body was found at the edge of the woods and was "definitely placed" there.

"We can say it's definitely not an accident. We'll be proceeding as a homicide," Harris said.

The body appears to have been there for several days, he said, and the decomposed state of the body makes determining the age, race and gender difficult.

The body has been sent to the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner in Chapel Hill to determine the cause of death and possible identification.

"We've already put out our missing persons alerts, and we're starting to get some feedback on that," Harris said. "We're following leads the best we can."

Residents call the area of Durham County where the body was found "the flats." At night, they said, it gets very dark and very quiet, and investigators said it's not surprising that someone would try to dump a body there.

"You could do it. It's easy to do it, but whew, it's just a tragedy man," said Ronnie Perry, who was fishing nearby.

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We can say it's definitely not an accident. We'll be proceeding as a homicide," Harris said......I'm so glad that they don't think someone can "accidentally" die inside a plastic bag.

ConcernedNCC
July 1, 2010 2:00 p.m.

Horrible! I wonder who he/she is?

wildcat
July 1, 2010 10:24 a.m.

"The (military) same folks who are to protect our entire country, can't protect their little town???"

Uhhh... The Posse Comitatus Act is a United States federal law passed on June 18, 1878, after the end of Reconstruction, with the intention of substantially limiting the powers of the federal government to use the military for law enforcement. The Act prohibits most members of the federal uniformed services from exercising nominally state law enforcement, police, or peace officer powers that maintain "law and order" on non-federal property within the United States.

The statute generally prohibits federal military personnel and units of the National Guard under federal authority from acting in a law enforcement capacity within the United States, except where expressly authorized by the Constitution or Congress

So please don't blame the military

gunny462
July 1, 2010 10:03 a.m.

When something happens in Durham, everyboby starts commenting on how bad Durham is. But I swear, There are WAYYYYY more bad news/murder stories in Fayetteville than in Durham. And hell, they are surrounded by military! The same folks who are to protect our entire country, can't protect their little town???

Con Amor luvs u regardless
July 1, 2010 8:46 a.m.

Durham does it again! When anyone asks me where NOT to move in the triangle I immediately tell them about how rough Durham can be. I lived there a few years back in the 80's and had 2 cars stolen from my gated condo parking lot and then a dead body was found laying on the sidewalk just across the street with about 10 knife holes in it. Durham is still a very worn out crime infested place and I feel sorry for the folks that are forced to live there.