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A tragedy turned even more tragic when a suicide victim’s body, thought to be a mannequin for an April Fools’ Day joke, was thrown into a dumpster.
As reported by WFTS ABC Action News, the desk clerk at the Peterborough Apartments for Seniors in St Petersburg, Florida, was taking a smoke break at 4.30am when he found the body, that he thought was a mannequin, in the south parking lot.
The find occurred on April 2 and Mike Puetz, a Stxxx Petersburg Police Department spokesman explained, “His first reaction to this was that it was an April Fools prank.” The clerk solicited the help of two newspaper delivery people and they moved the body to a dumpster.
It was not until later that morning at 8 am that an apartment maintenance worker accurately identified the body as human. Police were called and found that the body was that of a 96-year-old woman who had jumped from the 16th floor. The woman, whose name has not been released as police work to notify her next of kin, was suffering from depression and left a suicide note.
Though it may seem absurd that anyone would mistake a human body for a mannequin, police have pointed to the darkness of the early morning as a possible reason for the confusion. They also believe that the elderly woman’s body was distorted from the impact of her fall and rigor mortis had probably already set in when she was discovered.
A memorial has been laid outside the building and the woman’s loved ones are trying to cope with the sad loss. — AFP
Londile Moyo
Online Reporter