The Jasper County Sheriff’s Department and the Jasper Police Department are investigating after the body of a man was found in an old abandoned house. Meanwhile, Jasper Police Chief Garrett Foster says the body is that of a man who was recently reported missing.
The discovery was made late Friday morning in a wooded area off of Farm to Market Road 777 near the intersection with Highway 63 West.
According to Chief Foster, on Sunday, February 16th, the family of 66-year-old Phillip Bruce Jones, who was suffering with lung cancer, reported him as missing and they said that he had not been seen or heard from in several weeks.
Foster said officers checked at several locations where the family said he might be, but they found no sign of him.
Chief Foster said of his officers was flagged down late Friday morning after a friend of the missing man found his body in the old abandoned house. Foster said the man told police that Jones often went to the house and that’s why he went there in an effort to find him.
Precinct 2 Justice of the Peace Raymond Hopson pronounced Jones dead at the scene and, although no foul play is suspected, Judge Hopson ordered an autopsy to determine the cause of death.