The body of a man last seen May 8 at the Bedford VA Medical Center in Massachusetts was found in the stairwell of a building at the facility on Friday.
The man was reported missing a few days after he was last seen at the beginning of May, according to CBS Boston. The identity of the man, who lived at the facility in Building Five, has not been released.
Residents say certain exits have been blocked off for months to prevent coronavirus spread and they wonder if that’s why nobody found the missing man in a stairwell for weeks.
Middlesex District Attorney Marian Ryan told the station that the incident is “very concerning” because he was wearing the clothes he was reported missing in.
“It appears that he’s been there from the eighth of May,” Ryan said.
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The federal government operates the VA hospital while a company called Caritas runs the housing complex.
In a statement, the company said it “is committed to the health and safety of our residents, and follows strict protocols when a resident is discovered missing. On May 13 we filed a missing persons report for a BVQ resident, and have been working with the VA and the Bedford Police to ascertain the whereabouts of this resident. The stairwell where the deceased man was found was outside the lease premises of Caritas Communities, is alarmed and solely controlled by the VA. Caritas Communities and the Bedford VA are cooperating fully with the investigation.”
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Bedford Police searched for the man, but could not find him, according to the station.
“We’re looking at obviously the circumstances around which he was last seen and looking at the efforts that were made from that day May 8 until today,” Ryan said. “We are going to be looking at all those circumstances and making an assessment of whether appropriate action was taken.”
Michael Hasson told CBS Boston that he lives two buildings over from the deceased man, that he is friends with him and had noticed his absence.
“He was just the friendliest guy to talk to,” Hasson said. “Everybody’s kind of scratching their heads like where did this guy go? He wouldn’t just disappear like that.”
An autopsy will determine how and when the man died.
Reach Julia LeDoux at Julia@connectingvets.com.
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