Joyce Carol Vincent: How could this young woman lie dead and undiscovered for almost three years?

[LongTomH]

How could a young, beautiful woman, who had lovers and apparently had a chance for a singing career, drop out of sight so completely that no one went looking? How could her body lie undiscovered and decomposing for so long?

On 25 January 2006, officials from a north London housing association repossessing a bedsit in Wood Green owing to rent arrears made a grim discovery. Lying on the sofa was the skeleton of a 38-year-old woman who had been dead for almost three years. In a corner of the room the television set was still on, tuned to BBC1, and a small pile of unopened Christmas presents lay on the floor. Washing up was heaped in the kitchen sink and a mountain of post lay behind the front door. Food in the refrigerator was marked with 2003 expiry dates. The dead woman's body was so badly decomposed it could only be identified by comparing dental records with an old holiday photograph of her smiling. Her name was revealed to be Joyce Carol Vincent.

................//snip

The image of the television flickering over her decomposing body haunted me as I got off the train on to the crowded platform. In a city such as London, home to 8 million people, how could someone's absence go unnoticed for so long? Who was Joyce Vincent? What was she like? How could she have been forgotten?

................//snip

At this point all that had been revealed in the press was that Joyce Vincent was 38 when she died, had been born in west London to parents who were from the Caribbean, and that some of her family had attended her inquest. Some reports suggested Joyce was, or had been, engaged to be married, and that before living in the bedsit she had been in a refuge for victims of domestic violence. But she didn't fit the typical profile of someone who might die and be forgotten: she wasn't old without family; she wasn't a loner, or an overdosed drug addict; nor was she an isolated heavy drinker. Who she was and the circumstances of her death were a mystery.

................//snip

Read more at: http://www.theguardian.com/film/2011/oct/09/joyce-vincent-death-mystery-documentary

[Skittles]

1. her family WAS looking for her - they had hired a private investigator

she was a bit of a drifter in real life (moved and changed jobs often) so it was not unusual not to hear from her, and at the end of her life she seemed to be in hiding from an ex who was an abuser and stalker

a very sad case indeed

[shenmue]

2. Lord have mercy

[jsr]

3. Recommend

[1StrongBlackMan]

4. The electricity was on ...

in the unit after 3 years?

Something is missing from the article.

[catbyte]

5. That was my first thought too. And the apartment, huh?

Sheesh--if I hadn't paid my rent or electric bill for even a month or 2, they'd respond. Perhaps things are done differently in the UK.