A person with continual well being situations was discovered lifeless earlier this month at a San Antonio Housing Authority advanced, and police imagine his physique had been there since final month’s winter storm.
On March 5, somebody reported to police {that a} foul odor was coming from the fourth flooring of the Truthful Avenue Residences, a southeast San Antonio excessive rise for low-income seniors and folks with disabilities.
Police had been informed that the tenants dwelling in Residences 413 and 414 hadn’t been seen in additional than every week, and as quickly because the officer stepped out of the elevator onto the fourth flooring, he was confronted by the odor.
The officer discovered a person lifeless in Condominium 413, mendacity on the ground subsequent to the mattress. The person seemed as if he’d been there greater than every week, in keeping with the police report.
“The warmers and oven had been all on, and the room was extremely popular,” the officer wrote within the report. “It appeared (the person who died) might have been there for the reason that snow storm.”
The seniors and folks with disabilities dwelling on the Truthful Avenue Residences had been among those left without heat, electricity and water for days throughout the record-cold storm that started the evening of Feb. 14 and lasted many of the week.
Police recognized the resident who died as Robert Charles Shumaker. One of many advanced’s managers later informed police that he had late-stage liver illness, ulcers and hypertension, in keeping with the police report.
“Shedding a resident is at all times saddening for our communities and the neighbors who develop into household,” the San Antonio Housing Authority stated in an announcement. “The resident in query had been out and in of the hospital with medical sicknesses since December.”
SAHA stated employees contacted Shumaker on Feb. 17 within the hospital. The company stated it doesn’t have entry to medical experiences, and the Bexar County Medical Examiner’s Workplace has not but responded to an inquiry concerning the precise date and reason behind his dying.
This isn’t the primary time a physique has gone undiscovered for a size of time on the Truthful Avenue Residences.
Two years in the past this month, the body of Thomas Lyons, a father of two, was discovered stuffed into the closet of Condominium 1116, hidden by a bathe curtain. Upkeep crews had searched the condo due to a stench that overwhelmed the eleventh flooring. He’d been shot a number of instances, and police stated his physique had been hidden there for months.
His homicide stays unsolved, in keeping with Crime Stoppers San Antonio.
“Are you able to think about what these folks went by with that odor?” stated State Rep. Elizabeth “Liz” Campos. “The identical factor with this man that was discovered (after the storm)… his physique was beginning to decompose, however but they’d folks sleeping there.”
Campos is amongst elected officers and residents who’ve criticized SAHA’s response throughout the catastrophic freeze.
SAHA stated its employees reached out to residents to supply them shelter elsewhere, however that only a fraction of them selected to go away, citing issues about contracting the coronavirus or having to go away their pets behind. On the time Shumaker’s physique was found, SAHA hadn’t informed police that he stated he was within the hospital on Feb. 17.
“The residents got the choice to remain on the conference heart,” the police officer wrote in his report. “(Shumaker) greater than possible had refused, and had handed sooner or later throughout the storm.”
SAHA spokesman Michael Reyes stated employees went “went door-to-door and made telephone calls to every resident” and ended up shuttling about 60 residents to the Grand Hyatt. Within the days that adopted, the company stated it delivered residents emergency provides and responded to restore requests.
Bexar County Commissioner Tommy Calvert stated he organized buses to move residents to lodges — not SAHA. He stated he came upon concerning the state of affairs as a result of a group advocate, Queta Rodriguez, referred to as him.
“It wasn’t anyone from SAHA,” Calvert stated. “It was Queta. She stated, ‘I’m right here, we want assist.’”
Rodriguez, a group advocate and Marine Corps veteran, had discovered by social media that residents at Truthful Avenue had been freezing of their residences. She arrived at the complex on Tuesday to seek out medically fragile seniors and folks counting on wheelchairs with out warmth, working water or a strategy to heat meals.
“The safety guard informed me he simply received there not too lengthy earlier than, and he was not conscious that they’d been with out electrical energy and water for a number of days,” Rodriguez stated. “Nobody from SAHA was there.”
marina.riker@express-news.web
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