Oxford Eagle, Sunday, July 9, 2006

Body found at Ole Miss stadium construction site
Yoknapatawpha County Coroner to ID remains

By KELLY SHACKLEFORD
Eagle Staff Writer

The skeletal remains of a body were found Saturday morning by construction crews working on renovations at the Vaught-Hemingway stadium on the Ole Miss campus.

Mike Velasquez, an employee of the ADS Concrete Placement Company, made the grisly discovery at around 8 a.m. while digging near the supporting foundations for the upper deck of the stadium, which is undergoing a $20 million renovation that includes expansion of the "Rebels Club" seating area on the upper level as well as bowling-in the south end zone to bring seating capacity to more than 60,000.

"You just don't expect to come to work and find something like this," Velasquez said. "It's not like Oxford is full of mobsters and Mafia types, you know?"

After several hours of excavation the body was taken to the Yoknapatawpha County Coroner's Office for a post mortem examination. Officials released an initial assessment late yesterday estimating the date of death as somewhere between four and five years ago and identifying the remains as belonging to a white male.

"It's possible that the body has been buried there some time," said Yoknapatawpha Sheriff's Department Public Information Officer Elizabeth Jones. "Those foundations have been in place for a few years now, so our initial guess is the body was placed there before then."

The stadium has undergone numerous renovations since it first opened in 1915 with a seating capacity of 24,000. The stadium's upper deck and the Rebels Club seating area were built in 1997-1998.

Jones refused to speculate as to the identity of the remains, saying investigators will check missing persons reports and descriptions in the hopes of identifying the body. A total of eight reports were filed during the time period estimated by the coroner, the Eagle has learned (see related story, page A1).

"Based on the preliminary report, and with the other evidence available from the scene, we should be able to narrow down the list of people," Jones said.

Around a million people are reported missing each year across the country, and Yoknapatawpha County gets its share of this miserable statistic. In 2005, 11 people were reported missing locally, a six percent increase from the previous year.

Jones said that although it's too early to determine how the person died, the placement of the remains suggests possible foul play.

"We are treating the find as suspicious," she said.

It is not yet known whether the discovery of the body will significantly delay the stadium project.

"Certainly what's important is making sure the authorities have all the information they need with regard to identifying the remains," said University of Mississippi Athletic Director Dave Metherall, who was notified of the find Saturday morning. "We'd definitely hope after that we could get back on track with our schedule and be ready to open for the fall season."