SALT LAKE CITY (AP) - A man whose body was in a freezer for as long as 11 years was the husband of the woman who had recently died in their apartment west of Salt Lake City, police said Tuesday.
But the autopsy that nailed down his identity didn’t help investigators solve how he died, who killed him or exactly how long his body was tucked into the chest freezer inside the couple’s apartment, said Tooele Police Sgt. Jeremy Hansen.
Officers discovered the body of Paul Edwards Mathers, 69, last Friday after finding his wife dead on the bed when they went there to check on her after she hadn’t been seen in two weeks.
Detectives couldn’t tell from looking at the fully intact body how he died, but suspect foul play, Hansen said.
The death of his wife, Jeanne Souron-Mathers, 75, is not considered suspicious.
They don’t know if she was involved in her husband’s death, Hansen said.
Detectives estimate the man’s body was in the freezer from between 1 and 11 years based on when residents in the apartment complex say they last saw him. The autopsy didn’t narrow down that time frame, Hansen said.
Souron-Mathers had lived in the apartment since 2007 in the city of Tooele, which has about 35,000 residents and is about 25 miles (40 kilometers) west of Salt Lake City.
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