The man's cause of death is still being investigated
An elderly Australian woman spent up to five years sleeping next to her brother's rotting dead body in a rat-infested house in Victoria, Metro reported. The woman, aged in her 70s, lived with the corpse in her public housing unit on Russell Street at Newtown in Geelong, which is considered an affluent suburb.
Police made the horrifying discovery after arresting the woman on December 29, 2022, on an unrelated matter. Forensic officers, clad in biohazard suits, had to navigate through heaps of rubbish, rats, deceased possums, and human waste to reach the remains, which had turned into a skeleton.
The woman is understood to have slept next to the corpse anywhere between two and five years. Notably, the man was last seen alive in 2018 by some of the residents living along the street.
However, the woman was released without charges in connection to the case and his cause of death is still being investigated. The house has been vacant for over a year.
"It was a bloody skeleton they removed, not a body. How can someone be living with a dead body next door for five years and not a single person knows about it? They've tried to sweep this under the rug. We have been living next to a house of horrors,'' neighbour Nicole Stratton told the Geelong Advertiser.
The woman was a Department of Families, Fairness and Housing tenant, prompting questions about how the body could lie undiscovered for so long. Locals said they had tried to make complaints about the smell to several government bodies for years, however, they did not pay heed.
The neighbours believe the "utter filth" inside the home helped hide the smell of the dead body.
"There was always a smell but we just thought it was the piles of rubbish. The blinds were always down and you could see the mould on the back of them,'' Ms Stratton added.
“Several welfare checks had been conducted at the property since 2021 due to growing concerns regarding lack of contact, lack of access and the poor state of the property,” a spokesperson of the Australian Department of Families, Fairness and Housing (DFFH) said.
They added, ''This is a tragic incident. We send our sincerest condolences to the man's family and friends.''