Body Found Chopped Up, Stuffed in Container With Concrete Yields Few Clues
Florida cops don't know victim's identity or who killed him.
Nov. 10, 2010 — -- The chopped-up remains of a man found in a container floating in a Florida canal have left police stumped about the victim's identity and who wanted him dead.
"Whoever did this was heinous," Ft. Lauderdale Sgt. Frank Sousa said. "Whoever did this had no regard and went to great lengths to conceal the identity of this victim."
The container was found floating in a canal that runs behind a Bed, Bath and Beyond superstore, according to local reports. It was discovered by a man who spotted the object floating in the canal that runs behind his home Nov. 6. Police believe the container could have been floating for a few days.
The victim appears to be a white adult male, about 6 feet tall.
The container, which police declined to describe in detail, was filled not only with the man's body parts but also a pair of gray New Balance sneakers in a size 10. A pair of prescription glasses were also found with the remains.
Also inside was concrete, which police say the perpetrator had probably hoped would sink the container.
Despite the gruesome nature of the crime, authorities said, few leads have surfaced in their search for anyone who might know the victim or who killed him.
"We don't have any leads, but someone in the public knows something and someone will eventually come forward," Sousa said.
Sousa said investigators are still diving in the water where the container was found, searching for other body parts from the victim that evidentially were not included in the container.
The neighbor who discovered the container told ABC News' Miami affiliate WPLG that when he got closer to the body, "there was a stench to it" and he know it "wasn't normal."
"It was half-filled with cement and it wasn't even submerged," the neighbor, who asked not to be named, said. "Something went awry, it was supposed to sink but it didn't.
"You could just see the toe and-or heel of a sneaker," he said.
Sousa said there is no connection between this apparent murder and a similar crime in nearby Delray Beach, where authorities found the body of a woman stuffed inside a cardboard barrel in her car last month.