The human head found in a bucket on the bank of a Dania Beach canal has the same DNA as body parts found a week earlier in a cooler near a Fort Lauderdale restaurant, police said Tuesday.
Investigators are still trying to determine the identity of the man who was killed and had his body parts spread throughout Broward County, Fort Lauderdale Police Sgt. Frank Sousa said in a statement.
The first remains turned up Nov. 6 in a container that washed up near Northeast 26 Street and Federal Highway behind a local diner, Egg and U. The parts were chopped up and mixed in cement, though police were able to recover a shoe and the prescription glasses the man was wearing.
Police said the victim was a white male, between 5'8" to six feet tall, and wore a size 10 New Balance sneaker.
The body was weighed down with cement with the intent of sinking it to the bottom of the canal, mafia style, investigators said. They stopped short of saying it may have been a mob hit.
Just days later, a man found the head inside a bucket that was resting on the side of a canal in Dania Beach, about a mile from where the other body parts were found.
William Hernandez, who works at a junkyard across the street from where the head was found, said the bucket had been sitting there for days before he decided to investigate.
"At first I thought it was a joke," Hernandez said. "I thought someone was pulling a prank, but then I saw it was real."
Police are asking anyone who knows someone who meets the victim's description who went missing recently to call Broward CrimeStoppers at 954-493-TIPS.
