2 death investigations underway involving Asheville homeless community

By Hannah Mackenzie

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    ASHEVILLE, North Carolina (WLOS) — Two separate death investigations are underway in Asheville and detectives are asking with any information to come forward.

According to the Asheville Police Department, the victims were found within 12 hours of one another.

APD Lt. Russell Crisp said officers arrived at the 100 block of Tunnel Road about 2:45 p.m. Sunday in reference to a welfare check. A man, found inside a car parked in the Buffalo Wild Wings parking lot, was deceased, he said.

“It did appear that the subject may have been living inside his vehicle,” Crisp said.

The victim’s identity has not been released, but Crisp said the death is not suspicious.

According to Crisp, the second death investigation took place behind the Aldi on Airport Road. Officers responded to the area about 2:15 a.m. Monday.

“Once they arrived on scene, they located a homeless encampment inside the woods,” Crisp said. “Behind the business, they found the subject who was unresponsive inside his tent, and he was deceased.”

Crisp was unable to confirm if the victim died of a drug overdose but said foul play was not suspected. Preliminary evidence from forensic finger printing revealed a possible match for an individual with a criminal history in Florida, he added.

The discovery of the victim at the homeless encampment comes on the heels of APD’s new homeless policy in which eviction notices for homeless camps were cut from seven days to 24 hours.

When asked about enforcing the policy, Crisp said the victim may have been the only one staying at the camp.

Amy Cantrell, director of BeLoved Asheville, an advocacy group for the homeless, said news of the homeless deaths was gut-wrenching. Cantrell shared her disapproval of APD’s new homeless camp policy.

“It’s an impractical policy and it’s not a compassionate policy,” Cantrell said. “We know in this town we don’t have enough shelter for everyone.”

Cantrell also said she was disappointed in the city’s lack of response to the ballooning problem of homelessness.

“We’ve got to urgently deal with this as a public health crisis and to begin to put the things that we know work into play,” Cantrell said. “We’ve been sounding the alarm for years. We need a whole scale policy that begins to help us as a community address this public health emergency.”

Since APD’s new homeless camp policy was implemented, crisp said tips on encampment locations have increased.

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