INDIANAPOLIS -- The body of a 77-year-old man was found Friday in his cobweb-filled home along with the badly decomposed bodies of two women believed to have been dead a year or more, authorities said.
Carl Forchee and the two women are believed to have died of natural causes, said Sgt. David Wilks of the Marion County Sheriff's Department.
The women are believed to have been Forchee's aunt and sister, he said.
An ex-state trooper who sometimes stopped by to check on Forchee discovered the man's fully clothed body in the living room of his home, Wilks said.
Sheriff's officials called to the home about 11:15 a.m. found the other bodies, both in bed in separate bedrooms. One body was nearly mummified and the other was in skeletal condition, authorities said. Officials said they believe Forchee died a day or two before his body was discovered.
Forchee apparently let no one in the home and was able to keep secret the existence of the two bodies and the disarray inside, officials said. The outside of the one-story brick ranch house was well-kept.
Neighbors did the grocery shopping and cut the grass for Forchee, who was known in the neighborhood as 'the Bubblegum Man.' Every Sunday he passed out bubblegum to neighborhood children, said Donna Bernhardt, secretary at North Liberty Christian Church where Forchee once taught Sunday school.
'He taught until the time that, because of the health of his aunt or sister -- I don't remember which one -- he stopped coming,' Bernhardt said.
