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Dying Alone & Loners' Unnoticed Deaths

WhistlingJack

Gone But Not Forgotten
(ACCOUNT RETIRED)
Joined
Oct 29, 2003
Messages
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Man lay dead 'for up to a year'

Man lay dead 'for up to a year'

An 81-year-old man found dead in his home could have been there for up to a year, police have said.

George Sutton's body was found in an upstairs room of the house in Cromwell Grove, Levenshulme, Manchester, when police broke in on Christmas Eve.

Neighbours had alerted officers after they became concerned about not having seen him for some time.*

Police said the death was not being treated as suspicious and the coroner had been informed.

Story from BBC NEWS:

Published: 2006/12/28 17:24:34 GMT

© BBC MMVI

* A whole year?!
[/b]
 
In FT 288 there's an article on people who've died in their own homes an not been forund for years.

Here's an item where the police looked for someone in her own home and didn't find her. It has to be admitted the house sounds a mess though.

Police miss woman's body in home
The body of a woman missing for three weeks has been found in her home, despite the property being searched by two officers when she vanished.
Jean O'Sullivan, 59, was last seen on 22 August and reported missing from her home in Falcon Square, Eastleigh, Hampshire six days later.

Her body was only found when officers returned to her house on Sunday.

Mrs O'Sullivan was described as a "hoarder" and Hampshire police said the body had been "hidden from view".

"The premises were initially searched on 29 August by two officers," a Hampshire Constabulary spokesman said.

"The house contained a very large quantity of items, which were stacked in layers and piles which made searching very difficult and at the conclusion of the search Mrs O'Sullivan was not located in the property."


Jean could be described as a hoarder of items and rooms within the house were full of property
Family statement


He said specialist search teams were sent to carry out further searches of the area around the property on 16 September.

"When the house was searched it took specialist search officers more than half an hour to locate the body which was hidden from view," the spokesman said.

In a statement, Mrs O'Sullivan's family said they were "happy and satisfied" with the way police had handled the search.

They said: "When our sister was reported missing, local police officers conducted an initial search of her property which we understand would have been difficult to perform.

"This is due to the fact that Jean could be described as a hoarder of items and rooms within the house were full of property."

Supt Barry Talbot said standard procedure had been followed during the inquiry, but added: "We are now reviewing procedures."

Police are not treating the death as suspicious.

Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/1/hi/e ... 004809.stm

Published: 2007/09/20 16:19:56 GMT

© BBC MMVII
 
Carol Morley's new film Dreams of a Life looks fascinating and sad, and somewhat sobering for us loners:

By rights, Carol Morley’s film about a woman whose body lay rotting in her Wood Green flat for more than two years should be a grim affair. Joyce Vincent passed away in her flat around Christmas 2003 and was found in January 2006. There was no suggestion of murder or suicide, although the 38 year old’s body was in such a state it was impossible to draw any solid conclusions from what remained of her. Whatever happened, the fact she was lying there for so long is startling enough. But other details tease the imagination further, not least that, when she was found, her television was still on and sitting next to her was a small pile of unopened presents

Source

Clip here.
 
Sad indeed. :(
 
..and sitting next to her was a small pile of unopened presents
Well, that's more than I'll be getting.

(I've got one - but I suppose that some people don't get any.. :( )
 
I wonder how many of us on here would be in the 'lonely' category? I doubt I'd be up here talking about stuff if my wife and our parents were still about.

Still, at least I wouldn't lie there for two years - the dog'd eat me. Actually, I've even thought about it, living on my own and off the beaten track - I think it would take about a week normally for me to be missed, but it could well be longer over Xmas.
 
I suppose I'm in the 'lonely' category, not having many friends.
However, I don't think my dead body could lie undisturbed in front of a TV for 3 years before somebody raised a fuss about it. I stay in touch with my family, and they'd get worried if they didn't hear from me after about a week. I also have a friend who co-owns my house (but who now lives away in Cambridge with his recently-acquired wife) who would probably pop by to pick up his post.
Wish I did have more friends, but it all requires lots of effort and the ones I do try to get close to decide to 'unfriend' me for no known reason. Sometimes it's a pointless waste of my energy!
 
I'm on my own here, but being next door to a shop and being a regular customer, I doubt I'd get more than a couple of weeks peace before being discovered.

Hate this time of the year, i don't like missing out on the fun, but i also object to being included in things I'm not interested in.

i'm becoming a grumpy old git
 
Still, at least I wouldn't lie there for two years - the dog'd eat me.

Cats would eat me. Probably no bugger would miss me but i'm sure some pet lover would call the RSPCA once they saw a thin enough cat on the windowsill, probably a few weeks after the 'food supply' ran out.
 
Yes, I'm on my own, too.
I do email my daughter every day to let her know I'm alive, simply because I don't want my much-loved cat to be left shut in, with no one to look after him. I doubt if he'd try to eat me -he's not very clever! I may be wrong there, of course!
 
BlackRiverFalls said:
Still, at least I wouldn't lie there for two years - the dog'd eat me.

Cats would eat me. Probably no bugger would miss me but i'm sure some pet lover would call the RSPCA once they saw a thin enough cat on the windowsill, probably a few weeks after the 'food supply' ran out.

Hey - I'd miss you, OK?
 
All of us, yes I include myself, who feel they are at the cheese n pineapple on a stick end of the friend buffet, are probably the ones that will be OK. The really lonely people, don't have anyone to mention they are alone to. And we're all probably paranoid enough about dying alone that at the first sign of an illness, we'd crawl to A&E. Or is that just me? Mmmm

As it happens, one of my Uncles was dead for three days before being missed. It doesn't sound a very long time, especially considering it was before the age of the internet and mobiles. However, he had an aneurysm whilst sat in front of the gas fire. This caused his body to swell, quite horrifically as I seem to remember being told. He had to be 'popped' to get through the front door.

Sleep tight :twisted:
 
Mythopoeika said:
BlackRiverFalls said:
Still, at least I wouldn't lie there for two years - the dog'd eat me.
Cats would eat me. Probably no bugger would miss me but i'm sure some pet lover would call the RSPCA once they saw a thin enough cat on the windowsill, probably a few weeks after the 'food supply' ran out.
Hey - I'd miss you, OK?
Any regular poster here might well be 'missed' after a few days 'no show', but it's not the same thing. It might result in a post or two in Quitters or Shapeshifters, but that would be it, because (for the most part) we don't know other posters' real identities or locations.

So even if Myth does miss BRF, he can hardly send the rozzers round to check if she's OK.

And posters can 'disappear' for a variety of reasons - computer crash (done that!), general change of work, lifestyle, etc, or getting pissed off with the MB as a whole or a particular group of posters.

So if I disappear over Xmas, it may be that I've topped myself in a state of severe depression, or maybe I just got drunk and spilled booze onto my keyboard and fritzed my system. (Done that too!)
 
rynner2 said:
So if I disappear over Xmas, it may be that I've topped myself in a state of severe depression, or maybe I just got drunk and spilled booze onto my keyboard and fritzed my system. (Done that too!)

PM'd you, Rynner.
 
See? Away for weeks and nobody missed me. QED.

Actually I count myself extremely lucky. I'll spend Xmas surrounded by people - some of whom I could happily live without - but mostly by people I really want to be with, with one or two major exceptions. But alone I won't be, and I'm very thankful for that.
 
stuneville said:
See? Away for weeks and nobody missed me. QED.
I noticed you weren't around, but I just thought "Typical lazy mod, hiding away when there's work to be done!" :twisted:
 
Christmas lights led to finding of man's body in Wexford
http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/fro ... 81812.html
CONOR LALLY, Crime Correspondent

Tue, Mar 20, 2012

THE BODY of a pensioner who died alone in a small terraced house in Wexford town at Christmas lay undiscovered until Sunday evening, when a woman passing on the street noticed a Christmas tree with lights on. Thinking it unusual she called the Garda.

When gardaí gained access to the house on Lower John Street in the centre of the town they found the decomposed remains of a man in his 60s who was originally from Britain.

Local people said the man did not mix much during his time in Wexford, and seemed to be a very private person.

The man’s remains lay on the floor in a bedroom of the small rented terraced house for weeks, his home still fully decorated for Christmas.

The body had apparently been in the spot where it was discovered for nearly three months without anybody noticing the man was no longer around and despite the Christmas tree with lights still on being visible from the street.

Fr Aidan Walsh of the local Franciscan Friary across the road from where the man was found said people from the area were shocked when news broke on Sunday that the he had been dead in a house in a busy part of the town for so long without anyone noticing.

“We didn’t know anything about it until we saw a commotion going on across the street on Sunday evening,” he said.

“We are shocked that someone was found like that. It’s very sad.”

The one-storey house where the man lived is widely known as the smallest house in Wexford.

The deceased’s name was not being officially released until the man’s family had been informed of his passing but his identity is known locally. He had lived in Wexford town for a number of years, and is believed to have lived in Kerry for a much longer period after moving to Ireland from England.

After the man’s remains were found at around 6pm on Sunday, the body was moved to Waterford Regional Hospital for a postmortem.

A spokesman at Wexford Garda station said they were not treating the death as suspicious.

He said it looked like the man had been dead for a long time. The woman who raised the alarm did so because she thought it was odd that the Christmas tree was still up in spring with its lights still on.

Investigating officers are now trying to piece together how the man’s death could have gone unnoticed for so long in a busy street close to the centre of town.
 
Not forgotten after all.

Poignant memento for a man the town forgot
http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/ire ... 41793.html
BARRY ROCHE, Southern Correspondent

Thu, Apr 12, 2012

AN ACOUSTIC guitar rested against the end of the dark coffin in the empty funeral parlour, the sole and poignant memento that yielded any clue as to the life and times of Alan Moore.

Originally from Salford, near Manchester, 61-year-old Moore lived a reclusive existence in the heart of Wexford town, and it was there at a small terraced house on Lower John Street that his body was found on March 18th last. He had been dead for up to two months

Moore was discovered in the bedroom of the rented house after a local woman had spotted Christmas lights in the window. She alerted gardaí who then contacted his landlady, and she made the grim discovery.

Gardaí spent several weeks trying to make contact with Moore’s family in the UK, and yesterday his brothers, Stuart and Mick, travelled to Wexford for an ecumenical service at Mulligan’s Funeral Home in the Faythe before his remains were cremated.

“The people of Wexford have nothing to reproach themselves over – Alan chose to live that sort of life, and just because he lived alone doesn’t mean that he was lonely,” said Stuart, who last saw his brother when their mother died in Lancashire in 1989.

Looking a little overwhelmed by the expressions of sympathy from the dozen or so mourners who came to pay their respects, Stuart and Mick spoke of how Alan seemed to have been content with his life in Ireland.

“He seemed to be happy here in Ireland – I know he travelled around a bit and he loved music, that was his great passion, he played guitar and he would sing anything,” said Mick as a local came to sympathise.

The small number of mourners lined the tiny funeral parlour to hear Church of Ireland rector Rev Ron Graham speak of how Moore had kept very much to himself before he expressed his sympathies to his brothers on their bereavement.

“I didn’t know Alan, but perhaps not that many people did, at least not closely, as sadly his body lay undiscovered for almost two months,” said Rev Graham as he began the brief prayer service with local priest Fr Michael O’Shea.

“Apparently, he wasn’t a great mixer or a great socialiser as people around here say, he kept himself to himself, but I do understand that he was a very intelligent and well-educated man and he was also a gifted musician, singer and songwriter.”

Among those at yesterday’s service was Imelda Lacey, who said she had not known Moore but had been so moved by the circumstances of his death that she came to pay her respects to him. “I thought the way his life ended was so sad – I wanted to come and I’m glad I did because it was such a dignified and beautiful service – as the Rev Graham said, all the sadness and sorrows and difficulties of his life are now over.”

After the service, Alan Moore’s two brothers, assisted by a local Garda sergeant, the undertaker, two local men and two journalists covering the funeral, helped hold the coffin before it was transferred to a hearse.
 
Dead Spanish man lay undiscovered at home for up to 20 years
Neighbours say they had not seen Vicente Benito for almost two decades, and thought he had moved away
Giles Tremlett in Madrid
guardian.co.uk, Friday 1 June 2012 17.28 BST

The remains of a Spanish man have been found lying in the corridor of his terraced house in the north-western village of Canizal some 20 years after he died.
Police looking for clues to the date of Vicente Benito's death point to the fact that the only coins and banknotes they could find in the house were denominated in pesetas, suggesting he had died well before the euro was introduced in 2002.

In fact nobody had seen Benito for almost two decades, though none of his neighbours in the village of 520 people thought there was anything peculiar about him failing to answer his doorbell for so long.

They long ago gave up ringing on it, assuming he had moved to neighbouring Portugal. There were rumours he had found a girlfriend, or was working as a shepherd in some other part of the world.

A few people remember being angry that he had left a dog tied to the metal bars across a window that gave straight on to the street, but that was a decade or two ago.
The dog was eventually cut loose and taken in by a neighbour, but no one tried to find out if Benito was ill in bed or somehow unable to get of his tiny house.
"We think he was last seen at least 15 years ago, but no one is sure," the mayor, Miguel Angel Herrero, explained.

Earlier this week, however, a nephew who lived in the village decided to break into his uncle's house.
"They say he wanted to see what had happened to his uncle," a neighbour told the local La Opinión de Zamora newspaper.
"I don't think I'll be able to sleep for at least a week," the young man reportedly said.

Benito would be 73 were he still alive, so would have been in his mid-50s when he died.
"He had stopped talking to his siblings and went to work as a shepherd. He was always off somewhere, so it didn't occur to people that he might still be in the village," said Herrero.

His ex-wife, who had gone to live with someone else, formally reported him missing in 1992. She had since remarried and moved to the nearby village of Olmo de la Guareña.

Villagers were unable to explain why, given that Benito was slowly doing up his house and had left a six-inch gap at the bottom of his front door, nobody had noticed a strange smell. Herrero suggested a nearby pigsty had blocked it out.

"These days there a lot of solitary souls in our villages," commented La Opinión de Zamora columnist Celedonia Pérez.
Local police were rumoured to have found a lottery ticket from Spain's ONCE organisation for the blind dating back to the early 1990s.
"They should check his bank account, that should show when he last took out money," a neighbour, María Victoria Barros suggested.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/ju ... vered-home
 
20 years! :shock:

What wonderful, caring neighbours.
 
Really sad.

Littlemore mother and daughter were 'dead for some time'
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-ox ... e-25154620

Police outside Littlemore house

The bodies at the run down house in Littlemore were found a week apart

A mother and daughter found in a dilapidated house in Oxford had been "dead for some time", police have said.

Named locally as Caroline Jessett, 52, and Pauline Jessett, 78, they lived in the "structurally unsound" house in Cowley Road, Littlemore.

The daughter was discovered on 21 November after an environmental health team contacted police, following calls from neighbours.

After work to make the house safe, the second body was found on Thursday.

Thames Valley Police said the deaths were "unexplained", but there was nothing to suggest they were suspicious.

'Reclusive for years'
Det Insp John Turner said it appeared the women had been "dead for some time".

Next door neighbour Raymond Bailey, who has lived in the area since 1964, described the women as recluses.

He added: "The mother I hadn't seen for 30 years. The daughter I used to occasionally see going to the shops, but I haven't seen her for quite awhile.

"Repairs hadn't been done for at least 20 years or more, since the husband died.

"It had been going on so many years - you didn't see them and so you didn't look for them.

"If you knocked on their door and asked how they were they wouldn't open the door."

Local businessman Juan Louro said he was "shocked" by the news.

He added: "I'm devastated, it's sad. I don't like things like this. It's sad enough when you die, but this is upsetting."

Det Insp Turner said police were not looking for anyone else in relation to the investigation.

"The house is now structurally sound and not a danger to anyone who may be walking past it," he added.

Post-mortem examinations on both women have proved inconclusive.

Oxfordshire County Council said they were not known to social services.

The police investigation at the house continues.
 
That is indeed very sad. A similar fate befell a man who once owned one of the last independent bookshops in my neighbourhood. He retired in 2005 and sold up and in the spring of 2010 he was found dead in his home. He was 80 years old. Apparently he had been dead for one or two months before his body was discovered. A friend of mine who had worked in his shop for a while years earlier attended his funeral and learned that the man had apparently died of a stroke. It's awful to think that he may have lain there incapacitated but still alive for who knows how long. It was a sad ending for someone whose shop brought pleasure to a lot of people, myself included.
 
Sad to hear of any bookshop closing but so much sadder to hear of a former owner ending up like that.
 
Body of retired vicar Basil Bevan in Anglesey house for years
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-nort ... s-25733930

Police were called to the house in October last year

The body of a retired vicar which was found in a house on Anglesey had probably been there almost three years, an inquest has heard.

Police were called to the Llandegfan house last October after neighbours reported not seeing the Reverend Basil Bevan, 85, for sometime.

Officers found his body in a mummified state, the inquest heard. His wife was also living at the house.

The coroner recorded a verdict of death from natural causes.

Officers who spoke to the vicar's wife decided she was unwell and took her to hospital.

The inquest in Llangefni was told that in interviews Pauline Bevan described how her husband had a heart attack in November 2010.

Concern
Dewi Pritchard Jones, senior coroner for North West Wales, said there had been problems identifying the body.

A DNA comparison with the cleric's brother only gave a partial match because of the poor quality of the sample.

The coroner said he was satisfied the body was that of Dr Bevan who, on the balance of probabilities, died of heart disease.

Mr Pritchard-Jones said: "Neighbours had commented to a police officer that they hadn't seen the Rev Basil Bevan for some time and there was concern regarding his welfare.

"After some time Mrs Pauline Bevan came out of the property and there was a discussion with the police officers present. She appeared to be unwell and was taken to hospital.

Mummified remains
"The police then went into the property, being concerned regarding Dr Bevan's welfare. When they went inside the property they found it was in a considerable state of disarray.

"On searching it they came across mummified human remains. The remains were not capable of visual identification."

He added: "For reasons that are not matters of concern for an inquest the body was allowed to remain at the property."

The cause of Dr Bevan's death was recorded as heart disease and the verdict was natural causes.

He was believed to have been ordained in 1955 and spent most of his career in Wales, serving in the Diocese of Swansea and Brecon before moving to north Wales in 1978.
 
Natalie Wood: Australian inquest into death of 'forgotten woman'
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-26043934

An elderly Australian woman lay dead in her home for around seven years before her body was found, an inquest was told on Thursday.

Police found Natalie Wood's body in her Sydney home in July 2011. She is believed to have died in 2004.

Police said she may have died after a fall, but the amount of time since her death made it "forensically almost impossible" to determine her death.

Ms Wood has been dubbed "the woman Sydney forgot" by local media.

She was born in 1924.

A police officer told the Glebe Coroners Court that Ms Wood "kept to herself... it got to a point she answered the door with a special knock".

Rings and valuables inside the house had not been touched, although there was no TV, fridge, mattress or purse inside.

There were cobwebs throughout the house, and a tree growing outside had spread into the upstairs of her home.

Ms Wood's sister-in-law, Enid Davis, said she last saw Ms Wood from a bus window in January 2004.

"There was no reason [we stopped talking] other than my husband had dementia and got very sick," she said.

Ms Davis and some of Ms Wood's cousins are seeking to claim her estate.
 
Dead woman's body found sitting in a car after six years after direct debits ran $54,000 bank account dry
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world ... 78773.html

Her death went unnoticed because all her bills were paid and her lawn regularly cut by a neighbour
KASHMIRA GANDER Author Biography Saturday 08 March 2014

A woman’s body that was degrading in the back of a car for over half a decade has been found lying in a garage in the US neighbourhood of Pontiac, Michigan.

As her bills were paid by direct debit, her mail sent to the post office, and her grass regularly cut by a neighbour for six years, the woman’s remains were only discovered in the Jeep Liberty after her bank account ran out of funds and someone was sent to check why mortgage payments had stopped.

The woman has not yet been formally identified but is believed to be 49-year-old Pia Davida Farrenkopf, the last owner of the house.

She was found clothed in a heavy jacket and jeans, which led investigators to suspect that she died in the winter, according to the Detroit Free Press.

The key was in the ignition, but switched to the off mode, according to Undersheriff Mike McCabe.

The death is being treated as a homicide at this time, and police say suicide by carbon monoxide is the likely cause.

Medical examiners hopes to find dental records to formally identify the corpse.

It is thought that the woman stopped working as a contractor in the financial department of the Chrysler car firm in 2008, when set up direct debit payments from her bank which at one time contained $54,000.

“It is kind of the perfect storm for a mysterious set of circumstance and a challenge because of the extreme degradation of the body,” said Oakland County Sheriff Michael Bouchard.

“The last withdrawal from her account was in March 2013,” he added.

Edward Caroll, who married Farrenkopf’s late mother three years ago, told local broadcaster WXYZ that Ms Farrenkopf was estranged from her family and did not answer her invitation to the wedding.

"I tried to find her through the Internet and everything and I never could find her. And I wrote a letter a couple times and I think some of them came back. Her mother hadn’t heard from her for years and years," he said.

Neighbours said the woman had family in Germany and would be gone for days or weeks at a time. When she was back home, she kept to herself, WXYZ reported.

“Nobody came over there to check on the lady. It's weird. And it's actually scary,” a neighbour who wished to remain anonymous told the local TV station.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world ... 78773.html
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Mummified Woman Dead for Six Years Reportedly Voted in 2010

Last week, a construction contractor discovered the mummified body of Pia Farrenkopf in the backseat of Farrenkopf's Jeep, which was parked in her garage. Strange as that is, the story gets weirder: Farrenkopf, who police say died sometime in 2008, registered for and voted in the 2010 elections.

According to records in Oakland County, Mi., Farrenkopf, whose body still hasn't been identified by the Medical Examiner's Office, voted in the November 2012 gubernatorial election in Michigan. Officials, however, say its possible the vote might have been an administrative error.


Investigators are attempting to use dental records to positively identify Farrenkopf, whose death is being treated as a homicide.

As for how her body went undiscovered for so long: She lived alone, a neighbor mowed her lawn every so often, her mail was returned to senders or sent to a P.O. Box, and all of her bills, including her mortgage payments, were automatically withdrawn from her bank account each month.

"[Her yard] was pretty manicured," a neighbor told the Detroit Free Press. "There was no indication there was a body in there, at all."

When the approximately $54,000 in her savings account ran out, her home was foreclosed on by her bank, who sent a contractor to evaluate the property. That's when her body was found.

"All these things kind of led to the perfect storm of no one saying, 'What's going on there?'" Oakland County Sheriff Michael Bouchard told the Detroit Free Press, adding that Farrenkopf likely died in "late 2008."

Farrenkopf worked for Chrysler until September 2008, when she was laid off. Investigators are still awaiting the results of her autopsy, though suicide by carbon monoxide poisoning is unlikely.

"The key was in the ignition. The ignition was not on," Bouchard said to the Detroit Free Press. "The key was partially out."

There were no signs of obvious trauma to the body, or what remained of it. Brouchard told WXYZ that, because of the body's decomposed state, investigators may never find out how she died.

"If someone is poisoned, that would be in their blood and muscle," said Bouchard. "We don't have blood or muscle."
http://gawker.com/mummified-woman-dead- ... 1541508827
 
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