A mother reported her son missing in March. Police kept the truth from her for months.

[SpankMe]

This kind of story triggers me and breaks my heart. Story's a little long-ish, but worth the read.

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/bettersten-wade-dexter-jackson-mississippi-police-missing-rcna121697

Summary (my own re-telling):

A guy was accidentally hit and killed by a police car on a highway. Even though the cops were quickly able to identify him, they never notified his mother. His body sat in the morgue for months, and then they eventually buried him in a "pauper's graveyard" - still without notifying his mother. (This graveyard is where this county buries unclaimed bodies and marks the graves only with numbers.)

His mother had reported him missing only a day after he didn't return home, so this became a missing persons case. She had regularly called the police during these months asking if there was any status on the whereabouts of her son. They consistently reported to her that there was no new information. Although the police knew he had died, they didn't know where his body went as there had been communication lapses between the coroner's office and the police. So, while they knew he was dead, they didn't know where the body was and didn't even report the death to the mother. So, the police kept the case open as a missing persons case.

The main investigator then retired, and a new investigator - who took over all of the retiring guy's cases - picked up on the case, found the status of the missing man after only 2 weeks, and contacted the mother. The mother and her sister were finally able to go to this graveyard and find her son's grave. Vary sad. At this point, she's trying to scrape up the money to move her son's body to a proper cemetery.

Location: Jackson, Mississippi. Race of deceased man and family: Black. (My nominal liberal paranoia and prejudices tells me this is somehow relevant to the case.) Annoying factoid from the article: Even after all this, she still had to pay a $250 fee to the coroner's office to claim the body.

[CrispyQ]

1. I read this yesterday & it left me speechless at the cruelty. -nt

[Stargazer99]

2. My response is when someone complains that we are treating the police

badly I suggest that the police start CLEANING UP THEIR OWN before whining about no respect. It's called responsibility

[patphil]

3. So, the police kept the case open as a missing persons case.

You would think that something like this couldn't happen. But then this was Mississippi, and the kid was black, so it all falls into prospective.
The police simply didn't care; not even the slightest.
I hope the mother sues the police department.

[dchill]

4. Loose ends.

This makes me sick.

[Blue Owl]

5. I smell a big, well-deserved law suit