Mystery Car Full of Concrete Exhumed in Silicon Valley

The scariest a part of Palo Alto was once the variety of failed tech startups, till now. Last week, authorities dug up a automobile within the yard of a Silicon Valley mansion which solely led to extra questions concerning the automobile’s contents and proprietor.

Landscapers in Atherton—an prosperous California suburb positioned in Silicon Valley—made a startling discovery within the yard of a mansion based on The Guardian. Authorities had been notified final week of a Mercedes-Benz buried roughly 4 to five toes (1.2 to 1.5 meters) beneath the soil within the mansion’s yard. This weekend, authorities exhumed the automobile solely to seek out it stuffed with unused baggage of concrete. While no human stays had been immediately discovered by authorities, cadaver canine reportedly signaled the potential presence of them three separate instances.

“This examination did not reveal anything unusual or suspicious at the scene and no human remains were located,” Atherton Police mentioned in an announcement, as quoted by The Guardian. “This concluded our on-scene investigation.”

According to a extra in-depth report by Mercury News, the automobile belonged to Johnny Bocktune Lew, a person with a checkered historical past of felony exercise—together with insurance coverage fraud. Bocktune allegedly reported the automobile stolen from a Stanford buying heart in 1992 and was in a position to stroll away with $87,000 within the type of an insurance coverage payout. For reference, that’s over $180,000 adjusted for inflation.

“This book has 15 chapters in it and we’ve only got two chapters. I don’t know if we’re ever going to get the other chapters, but I sure hope we do because it is an interesting story,” San Mateo County District Attorney Steve Wagstaffe informed Mercury News.

While that will really feel like the tip of the story, questions stay. If no human stays had been discovered, what scent did the cadaver canine decide up on? What had been the baggage of concrete for? Wagstaffe additionally identified that the Benz was probably new when Lew reported it stolen, and argues that Lew wouldn’t essentially be making a acquire with this potential rip-off. Lew bought the mansion property in 2014 and died a yr later, leaving the reality behind the mysterious buried automobile but to be decided.