Seattle police are investigating a death after a body was found in the West Beacon Hill area of the city. The human remains were discovered near the Mountain to Sound Greenway Trail, in a greenbelt in South Seattle. According to police, the investigation is really just getting started, and detectives say they need more time before they can say much about the case. For now, officers are stopping short of calling the death a murder.
The discovery came about in an unusual way. Firefighters were the ones who actually found the human remains at the scene. They had been called out to the greenbelt after a driver on Interstate 5 spotted a brush fire burning in the area. That report came in at around 6:30 in the evening, drawing crews to the location where the body was later found.
Police have been careful about how they describe what they found. They are stopping short of calling the case a murder, saying only that something about the body was, in their words, suspicious. A local reporter said he had reached out to the Seattle Police Department for more clarity on what exactly was suspicious, but was told that detectives need more time before they can say anything further.
As of the morning after the discovery, no one had been arrested in connection with the death. Police also said that they do not believe the person died in the fire itself. That detail suggests investigators are treating the fire and the body as connected in some way that is still being worked out, rather than assuming the flames were the direct cause of death.
Investigators pointed out that this is not the first time police have been called to this same spot for a possible killing. Last October, police found a 37 year old man who had been shot in the head at almost the exact same location. In that earlier case, a small fire had also been lit nearby, echoing the circumstances now under examination at the scene.
The cause of the brush fire that led to the grim discovery remains unclear. The Seattle Fire Department said that the cause of the fire is still under investigation, and it is not yet known whether the fire was started deliberately or by accident. Reporters at the scene said they were continuing to seek more answers from police and fire officials as the investigation moved forward.