SUFFOLK COUNTY, N.Y. (TCN) — A homicide investigation is underway after a missing woman’s body was found inside a suitcase near an apartment building this week.
Seikeya Jones was reported missing to the Suffolk County Police Department on Aug. 16 after she failed to return to her home in Huntington Station on Long Island.
According to ABC News, on Tuesday, Sept. 3, Suffolk County Police responded to a call about “suspicious activity” in the woods near an apartment. Police reportedly noted in a press release that officers “found a deceased person in a suitcase next to the building.”
One resident in the apartment told WABC-TV, “The police came and lifted it and saw it was a body. The smell was rancid. Potent.”
The victim has since been identified as Jones.
WABC reports Jones grew up close to where she was found dead.
Her mother, Yolando Terrell, told WABC, “I’m looking and I’m looking, and I can’t find her. I come back from vacation, and I see on the news that my daughter is in a suitcase.”
Jones’ sister spoke about how the family “could not help her get a hold of her mental health,” but said that “does not give anybody the right to put their hands on my sister and put her in a suitcase and stuff her inside these bushes like she was nothing.”
ABC News reports an autopsy is pending to determine her cause of death.