Mystery in Pa. Parking Lot: 'Almost Certainly Human Blood'

Police in Silver Spring Township are scratching their heads over a 4x7 pool of blood but no body
By Jenn Gidman,  Newser Staff
Posted Sep 2, 2022 12:58 PM CDT
In a Pa. Parking Lot, Eyeglasses and Pools of Blood, but No Body
Stock photo.   (Getty Images/carlballou)

Police in a Pennsylvania town are trying to solve a gory mystery, and so far, clues have been scarce. The main evidence they're working with right now, according to Silver Spring Township Police Chief Chris Raubenstine, who appeared at a Thursday presser: a pair of Ray Ban prescription eyeglasses found Saturday morning in the parking lot of the Silver Spring Courtyards retirement community, as well as two pools of blood nearby, per PennLive.com. Raubenstine says the smaller of the blood pools was found on the grass along the perimeter of the lot, near the exit, but the larger one—one that measured 4 feet by 7 feet—was discovered smack in the middle of the pavement, with no body in sight.

Police say they didn't find any signs of a struggle or an accident at the scene, and no residents at the retirement home or patients at local hospitals were reported to have suffered any kind of injury that would have caused that much blood loss. And no clues popped up during a helicopter search, or from using cadaver dogs or conducting door-to-door checks, Raubenstine noted at the news conference. "All we can say about that amount of blood ... [is that] a very serious injury [had] occurred," he said, per the Kansas City Star, stressing that police can't determine at this time if a crime has taken place.

Police believe the blood showed up sometime between 11pm Friday and 7am Saturday, and they say preliminary tests have shown it to be "almost certainly human blood." It appears they know the gender of the person the blood came from, but Raubenstine said they're not releasing that info just yet. An investigation is ongoing, assisted by the Pennsylvania State Police, forensic investigators from the Cumberland County District Attorney's Office, and the nonprofit Summit Search and Rescue. (More mystery stories.)

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