Cops not reviewing Brockton body bungle
Authorities have no immediate plans to investigate how homicide detectives managed to leave a bag of human remains behind at a Brockton crime scene for the victims’s family to discover.
“The Massachusetts State Police currently are focused on the ongoing investigation and prosecution of his homicide,” spokesman David Procopio told the Herald. “As such, there is no departmental review underway at this time of the family’s discovery of Mr. Shaw’s partial remains. Any such decision would be made at the conclusion of criminal proceedings.”
State police detectives assigned to the district attorney’s office were in charge of the crime scene, Procopio said. A Brockton police spokesman did not respond to requests for comment. Plymouth District Attorney Timothy Cruz, whose office is in charge of the investigation, refused to directly address the bag of body parts the victim’s family stumbled upon, once the crime scene was broken down and they were allowed back in.
“We are proceeding with the case against Kathryn Podgurski and the homicide investigation is ongoing,” Cruz spokeswoman Beth Stone said.
Shaw was stabbed more than 30 times and his body mutilated by his girlfriend, Podgurski, police said. Cops found him dead, and stuffed in a closet of their apartment on Friday.
Podgurski was arraigned Monday on a murder charge and ordered held without bail. The victim’s cousin, Jacinda Shaw, told the Herald the family went to her uncle’s Green Street apartment to collect his belongings. That’s when they noticed a backpack beside a bureau in the bedroom with blood on the zipper. Shaw said the bag felt heavy and when she opened it she saw a foot. She said the horrified relatives dumped the bag on a bed along with another bag, when what they believe was the victim’s arm also tumbled out.
The remains were sent to the medical examiner’s office for further study.
At Podgurski’s arraignment on Monday, Assistant District Attorney Richard Linehan said Joseph Shaw, 44, was last seen at a family party on July 15 or 16.
The victim, according to a police report, had been upset Podgurski had told him she was pregnant.
Podgurski claimed two men broke into the apartment, trying to rob her and Shaw for drugs or money, the police report said. She told cops Shaw got “loud” during the confrontation, and one of the men had stabbed him with her knife and told her not to call the police. The accused told investigators his body was in the closet, next to the refrigerator, for six days, the report said.