Jarred Smith was arrested and charged with concealing a dead body in a stranger's landscaping.
I used to think there was nothing worse than coming home from vacation and having to mow an overgrown lawn. Well, it apparently can get much, much worse.
Scott Mattice and his family, of Spotsylvania County, Virginia, had just returned home from a vacation to Virginia Beach when he decided to get out the lawn mower and cut his grass. Just as he was getting ready to start, a strange smell led him to the side of his porch. He discovered a dead body that had been hidden inside of his landscaping.
“It looked like NCIS,” Mattice said, trying to make light of the discovery.
Obviously, Mattice called police to report the find. They identified the body as being 23-year-old Deandre Miller-Caldwell. This is where the story gets really crazy.
Caldwell had been driving with a friend, Jarred Smith (shown above), a few nights before. According to police reports, Smith lost control of his vehicle and careened into a ditch in front of the Mattice home. Neighbors came rushing over to help and discovered Caldwell's body lying in the ditch. However, Smith reassured them that he was just intoxicated. Well, it turns out he was dead.
Once the neighbors left, Smith apparently decided to drag the body up to the house and hide it in the shrubs. Police say it sat there for three days before the family returned home from vacation.
A preliminary autopsy was not able to confirm a cause of death, but medical examiners have confirmed that Caldwell used heroin shortly before his death.
It didn't take long for police to piece together what happened, given the fact that the same police department responded to both the accident and the discovered body. Officers promptly arrested Smith and charged him with concealing a dead body. As the investigation continues, more charges may be filed.
