Cops investigate after a body was found in the back seat of a car left at South Shore Hospital in Weymouth, Massachusetts (WBZ/YouTube).
Neighbors in a Massachusetts condominium complex watching news coverage of a body wrapped in a blanket — found in the back seat of a Honda Civic outside a hospital — came to the startling realization that they unwittingly helped the suspect move the victim, according to authorities.
Staff at South Shore Hospital in Weymouth, which is some 15 miles south of Boston, called police shortly after 2 p.m. Aug. 23 following the discovery of an unconscious man in the back seat of the Honda, the Office of the Commonwealth District Attorney Plymouth District said. A man walked into the emergency department and “alerted medical staff of a body within the vehicle.”
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Cops found an unresponsive man “wrapped in multiple blankets secured with duct tape.” Doctors pronounced him dead. He was later identified as 27-year-old Declan Perry. The suspect fled before cops arrived on scene.
As detectives investigated, people who lived at a condominium complex in Scituate called with crucial information. They had helped one of their neighbors move a “large, heavy blanket” into a black Honda Civic. The man, identified as 42-year-old Christopher Caron, told them inside the blankets was a “hockey goalie mannequin which was usually filled with water,” local Fox affiliate WFXT reported, citing court documents. Caron lived at the condo and drove Perry”s Civic to the hospital, cops said.
The Massachusetts State Police on Friday obtained a warrant for Caron’s arrest on a murder charge. Caron turned himself in to police on Saturday afternoon, according to prosecutors. He has a court date scheduled for Tuesday.
Cops collected several items of evidence at the condo. Those included clothing, surveillance cameras and swabs of suspected blood, WFXT reported.
Investigators have yet to release a motive but said the suspect and victim knew each other. They also have yet to release Perry’s cause of death.
Local ABC affiliate WMTW reports that Perry was a chef who lived in Portland, Maine. Perry’s friends told the outlet he was a talented chef who worked as the head cook at a local restaurant called the Grill Room.
