The buyer of a Brevard County townhouse went to check on his new investment property, and may have done what the exhaustive efforts of Wells Fargo Bank investigators did not: find the foreclosed-upon former owner.
Matthew Everly discovered skeletal remains in a dress in the passenger side of a Chevy Nova in the garage, and investigators hope an autopsy can reveal cause of death and whether the body is that of the previous owner, 57-year-old Kathryn Norris, who neighbors said hasn't been seen for months.
What makes the case so extremely unusual, if the remains are Norris, is that Wells Fargo went to great lengths to find her during the foreclosure process -- including tracking down a relative in South Carolina who hasn't heard from her in 13 years -- but no one ever actually entered the home before it was sold.
Everly said he was told the last remembered or documented contact with Norris was in August of 1999, and Wells Fargo officially declared Norris in default on her mortgage in February of this year.
But though the bank's investigators interviewed neighbors, used a process server, and tracked down relatives, she never turned up, and no one ever reported her missing.
On April 1, Wells Fargo filed papers stating "diligent search and inquiry have been made to discover [her] residences" but that she "cannot be found within this state for service of summons."
Neighbors were aghast at the thought Norris' home may have been sold over her dead body.
"The main thing I think is sad about it," said Marty del Castillo, "is that somebody could have their house foreclosed on and sold out from under them and they're still dead inside the house. I just think that's pretty inhumane, and it certainly says we need to change this process somehow, reach out to people a little better than that.
"At least make sure they're alive before you sell their house."
