Woman Finds Husband’s Body While Getting Christmas Decorations from a Closet 8 Months After He Went Missing

In an autopsy report from early March, a woman found that her husband had died of suicide. She reported him missing, but then she found his body inside their own home. He had crawled into a hidden closet and taken his own life. Only to be found eight months later.

His Car Was in the Driveway

Richard and Jennifer Maedge lived together in Illinois. Last year on April 27th, Richard went missing. On the day he disappeared, he called Jennifer to say he was coming home from work earlier than expected. However, when Jennifer got home, he was nowhere to be found. Weirdly, he had left his wallet and keys behind, and his car was still parked in the driveway. She had no way of contacting him. Worried, Jennifer filed a missing person report with the local police.

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Naturally, the policemen wanted to search Jennifer’s home.

But, this was not as easy as it sounds. Jennifer Maedge was what people would describe as a hoarder. This made her house difficult to move around because of all the boxes or stored things. They even conducted a second search when Jennifer noticed a rancid smell coming from somewhere in her home. The police found nothing on their second search of Jennifer’s home. So, she called a plumber who diagnosed the small as a sewer gas leak. After he placed a cap over the pipes in the basement, the smell seemed to dissipate.

She Found His Body Months Later

As Christmas approached, Jnnier wanted to set up some festive spirit, so she looked for the box with all the Christmas ornaments. There was a storage area underneath the stairs of her home where she usually kept them. This was where she found her dead husband’s body. He had been there for eight months, decaying. “I decided to put the Christmas tree up, and I was looking for a tote of Christmas ornaments, and that’s when I discovered him,” she said. “He had committed suicide.”

The coroner’s report confirmed that he had committed suicide, and there was no evidence of foul play. Richard’s body had been hidden under the stairs for so long his body had decayed to the point of mummification. This meant that the smell of decaying flesh was not as strong anymore. They explained that this was probably why it took so long to find his body.

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Another Dead Body was Found in a Hoarder’s Home

In a similar story, a woman’s body was found dead in her own home. Sally Honeycheck had never moved from her childhood home, which her parents had bought in 1951. She lived there with her sister. Sally’s neighbors were unaware of her and her sister’s hoarding tendencies as the house was well-maintained on the outside and kept themselves looking presentable. However, the inside of their home was falling apart and stacked to the brim with random ornaments and gadgets.

Then, her cousin, Linda Kajima, couldn’t get hold of Sally over Thanksgiving, which made her think something might be wrong.

So, she went over to Sally’s house to investigate. There she found her cousin’s body, bloated and missing her eyes, nose, and mouth. Furthermore, her bones were sticking out from under her sweater, exposing her skull. At first, she thought it was a prank for Halloween and carried on searching through the mess. Then, it dawned on her that the body was her cousin. It turns out that their dog, Jack, who was a Rottweiler, had clearly been eating Sally’s flesh. Jack’s body was also found dead in the house.

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