Georgia police sent on a welfare check said they found evidence that a group of people had moved into a dead man’s home and stolen his property while he decomposed in a bathtub for months.
Cobb County Police said they were called to the residence in Smyrna, a suburb of Atlanta, in early October by people concerned about the absence of 71-year-old Robert Westbrook.
‘It’s a shame and it’s sad. It’s just sad. To take advantage of a dead person is just sick.’
After entering the man’s home, they found his body in a bathtub.
“He was in a severe state of decomposition. It’s called mummification,” said Detective Daniel Goduto.
They believe that Westbrook’s body had been decomposing for about three months.
And in that time, a group of burglars had moved into the home to ransack his belongings and steal whatever they could, police said.
“Drawers were overturned. His master bedroom was completely just disheveled,” Goduto continued. “But then, there were items consistent with somebody still living there. The trash looked like it was taken out regularly. It looked like there was stuff in the garbage can that was fairly new.”
A day later, a neighbor called police to let them know there were people in the man’s driveway. Police responded and found four people loading Westbrook’s property into their car.
Westbrook’s car was also missing, and police were able to trace it to a gas station, where they found three other burglary suspects.
Police said they were using his credit cards and forging checks to steal his money. The suspects face a slew of charges, including burglary and fraud.
“It goes to show their moral compass, if you will,” Goduto said. “I mean, they broke into someone’s home. They saw him deceased on the ground and instead of saying, ‘Hey, we messed up. Let’s call 911. We found this guy dead,’ they decided to just live there.”
Westbrook is believed to have died of natural causes. When police tried to contact his family, they found that all of his relatives were dead.
One neighbor told WSBT-TV that she didn’t know Westbrook had passed away because he often kept to himself.
“It’s a shame and it’s sad. It’s just sad,” said Sonya da Silva. “To take advantage of a dead person is just sick.”
Scenes from the home can be viewed on WSB-TV’s news video on YouTube.
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