Vernelle Jackson has no regrets about burying her best friend in the backyard of her mobile home property in Norway about 18 months ago.
It was an expression of love and respect to a longtime friend, whose dying wish was to be laid to rest near her friend and caregiver, Jackson, an 81-year-old South Carolina native, said in a telephone interview Wednesday night. The two had met and become friends years ago when they both lived in the South, she said.
Jackson decided to bury her friend, whom authorities have not yet identified, after the woman became seriously ill and bedridden. Jackson said her friend, who was born in 1937, was under the care of a doctor as well as hospice care in the months before she died.
Maine State Police came to Jackson’s home at 239 Harrison Road in Norway for a well-being check on the woman on Tuesday, Jackson said.
A former nurse’s aide, Jackson said she has fully cooperated with state police, who informed her that she needed a permit to bury a person. Jackson said she told police that her friend died from natural causes.
State police detectives and evidence technicians located the woman’s remains during a search of the property on Tuesday. The woman had been buried in a shallow grave behind the mobile home, near the home’s well.
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