Smell of Death
I used to be a general beat reporter for daily newspaper in Pittsburgh. We heard on the police scanner that there was a potential stand-off in one of the residential neighborhoods, so I sped off to the scene to cover it.

When I arrived, police had the perimeter of the building secured for about a 20 yards, but we were still close enough to see all access points and windows, etc.

As it turns out, the guy was preparing to kill as many people as he could - had bullets and weapons all over his apartment. Instead, he barricaded himself inside and blew his head off...several months prior.

Since he was divorced and a bad employee, no one missed him.

The funny part of the story is that this was in August and Pittsburgh summers can get pretty balmy. He naturally began to stink as he rotted. The landlords of the building couldn't figure out where the smell was coming from and started plugging air fresheners into every open outlet.

I interviewed them afterwards and the smell got so bad that they went through the trouble of emptying the refrigerator of one little old lady that they suspected of being senile, assuming she had a frige full of stale food. (Apparently, they had to do this task once before for her...)

From our vantage point, once his apartment was opened, we could smell him clear out in the parking lot. In fact, I took a walk around the block to the other side of the apartment complex and you could smell him everywhere...

Anyways, the deceased was completely liquified and more fit for a pitcher than a body bag. The coroner's assistant said that when they get this bad, you need to pry them off the floor with a spatula.

And that's me tale.
(DeSade - is grannyfappin, Thu 28 Feb 2008, 17:42, Reply)