Body Found At Rackham

Detective Sgt. Gregory Katapodis, Right, Photographs The Body,

Detective Capt. Walter Hawkins Is At Left

Body Found At Rackham

By William B. Treml

(News Police Reporter)

The frozen body of a white youth was found late this morning on the floor of an outside air conditioning enclosure at the University’s Rackham School of Graduate Studies.

Police Chief Walter E. Krasny said no identification or cause of death was immediately available.

The body was discovered on the deck of the enclosure which houses the air conditioning unit for the Rackham Memorial Building. That enclosure is located on the E. Huron St. side of the building, although the main entrance to the Graduate School is from E. Washington near Thayer St.

Chief Krasny said the victim could have scaled the wall surrounding the air conditioning machinery or may have opened a steel gate leading to it and walked down a short flight of stone steps. The gate was unlocked when the body was found. Krasny said there are places on the eight-foot-high wall which could be used as foot holds for someone attempting to climb over it.

A preliminary check of the body did not reveal evidence of foul play but an exact cause of death will not be determined until an autopsy is completed, Krasny said.

Detectives and uniformed officers on the scene said the youth was about 18 to 22 years of age. The body was fully dressed when found. Officers said the youth had room to move around inside the enclosure and could probably have crawled back over the wall or to the steel gate if he had been conscious.

A deputy medical examiner was called to the scene.

Chief Krasny issued an appeal this

noon for contact with another youth who apparently first saw the body this morning. The young man told a passerby: "That’s either a body or a dummy over there."

Moments later University security officers were notified and Ann Arbor police called.

The dead youth was described as good-looking, short haired and clean-shaven. Detectives said he was “well dressed.’’

When the body was finally freed from the floor of the enclosure, it was taken to the Pathology Department at St. Joseph Mercy Hospital. There a cause of death will be determined, police said.