An Arizona man was arrested last week for allegedly stuffing his late father’s corpse in a backyard freezer and leaving it there for years — while he continued to cash the old man’s Social Security checks.
Tempe police said a tip was received on Oct. 22 that a body may have been hidden in 51-year-old Joseph Hill Jr.’s yard. according to ABC 15 Arizona.
When police arrived at the home near McClintock Drive and Baseline Road, Hill wouldn’t let them go near the freezer — but detectives kept pushing and eventually obtained a search warrant.
When authorities returned a few days later, they burst into the freezer — which was tightly packed with tarpaulin, blankets, Saran wrap and duct tape — and found a shocking surprise: the skeletal remains of a human body, the network said.
Hill finally got out and reportedly told police he bought the freezer after his father died four years ago.
He had feared he would lose the house – which his father had lived in since it was built in the 1960s – if he reported the death, ABC said.
“His father was weak and could barely walk,” a neighbor told the station. “He was often sick.”
After his death, Hill stuffed his late father in the freezer and left him behind — but he continued to collect his father’s Social Security benefits every month until March 2023. CBS 5 News in Phoenix reported.
Hill also allegedly told police that he had moved the freezer several times over the years and eventually planned to bury his father in the desert.
But every time he brought it out, there were “always people out there.”
The freezer has been left outside without power for the past six months, CBS added.
Police charged him with concealing a body and failing to report a death – although police say more charges could follow.
He is being held in the Maricopa County Jail on $25,000 bail, reports said.
“It’s absolutely shocking,” said one neighbor. “Especially when you have little kids asking, ‘What happened at Joe’s house?'”
