Cop Finds Dead Man in Back of Police Car

Police in Houston are trying to figure out how a man ended up dead in the back of a police vehicle. The body was found Saturday afternoon in a marked police Ford Explorer parked outside a city-run drug and alcohol treatment center, ABC News reports. "An officer with our Mental Health Division went to his patrol vehicle to begin his shift and discovered a deceased male in the back seat," police said. The man, who appeared to be homeless and in his 40s, was not in custody. Police said it "appears he may have been seeking shelter from the weather."

Investigators said the officer parked his vehicle after his shift ended Wednesday morning. Fox26 reports. When he returned to it for his next shift on Saturday, he opened the unlocked front door and found items that were not his on the front seat. He then found the dead man in the back cage of the vehicle. The back area of the vehicle is designed so that it can't be unlocked from the inside. Investigators believe the man became stuck after trying to crawl through the rear cage into the vehicle's rear cargo area, reports KHOU11. Police say the investigation is ongoing and an autopsy report will determine the cause of death. It's not clear how long the man was in the vehicle. (More Houston stories.)