An Albany man was arrested on suspicion of putting a dead man inside a suitcase and stowing the luggage in the man’s car, police said.
Salem police officers found Richard Eugene Flennory dead Thursday morning after one of his neighbors at Claxter Court Apartments called to report seeing someone remove a large suitcase from an apartment and put it inside Flennory’s car, according to police.
Flennory, 59, had not been seen for several days, police said in a news release.
During the investigation, detectives found two people living inside Flennory’s apartment in the northeast Salem complex.
Authorities took one of them — Linson Lavell Johnson, 51, of Albany — into custody on a warrant for a parole violation.
When Johnson discovered Flennory dead, he put Flennory inside the suitcase and into the trunk of the vehicle “to avoid a police response,” police said.
Police said Flennory had multiple health problems that may have contributed to his death.
The state medical examiner’s office determined there was no indication of foul play in Flennory’s death.
Johnson was arrested on suspicion of second-degree abuse of a corpse and a parole violation. He’s being held in the Linn County Jail.
Johnson was acquitted of second-degree attempted murder charges in an Albany child abuse case 20 years ago when his son, then four years old, suffered a brain injury in the family home and was found unconscious.
Johnson was found guilty in 2000 of four counts of tampering with a witness, three counts of coercion, three counts of second-degree criminal mistreatment and two counts of fourth-degree assault.
