PHILADELPHIA, Dec. 15 (UPI) -- Construction workers found human bones under the basement floor in a Philadelphia rowhouse, police said.
Because investigators believe the bones are old, the case has been turned over to an archaeologist, The Philadelphia Inquirer reported. The bones were in seven shallow graves, suggesting the house in the Fairmount section of the city was built on an old graveyard.
"I'm told the bones may have been there over 100 years," Lt. Frank Vanore, a police spokesman, said Monday.
Gwendolyn Brown, who lives next door, grew up in the house where the graves were found. She and her brother sold it in 2005 after her mother, Katherine Irby, died, and it now belongs to a Huntingdon Valley, Pa., company, Big Rental Inc.
Brown said she never realized what was under the basement and described the discovery as a "shocker."
Some of the bones were discarded with dirt removed from the basement before construction workers realized they had found human remains, police said.
