FOX CROSSING, WI (WTAQ-WLUK) – A man who discovered his roommate had died of an apparent drug overdose was convicted Tuesday of hiding a corpse for wrapping her body in a tarp and leaving it in the basement, instead of calling police.
Erik Averbeck will be sentenced July 13 after entering the no contest plea.
Prosecutors will recommend probation and a year in jail, although the maximum penalty would be 12 1/2 years in the prison system.
According to the criminal complaint, the female victim, who is not named, was living in the basement at Averbeck’s home on Fatima Street in Fox Crossing. Police and probation agents received information the woman may have died of an overdose, and went to the home for a welfare check on Dec. 15. There, the body was found “tightly wrapped and bound,” the complaint says.
Averbeck told police he found the woman, dead, the day before. He had last seen her three days before that, on the 11th.
“The defendant stated he does not know how the decision was made, but they decided to, ‘wrap up the body, and clean up down there,’ and figure out what to do from there. The defendant stated there was no plans as to what they were going to do with the body,” the complaint states.
Preliminary autopsy results showed the woman had fentanyl in her system, according to the complaint.
Averbeck is not charged in connection with her death itself.
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