When police were called to a Pennsylvania home to perform a welfare check, nothing could have prepared them for the gruesome sights they were about to see. After showing a cop a “doll” in the freezer, the resident told police that he had made an even more “disturbing” discovery in his dad’s bed. Be forewarned, the details are disturbing.
Donald Meshey Jr, a 32-year-old Lancaster, Pennsylvania man, first drew the attention of police after they received a call from a family member, expressing concern over the well-being and mental health of her relative. Responding to the report, a police officer arrived at Meshey’s residence, a small apartment in the 200 block of West Strawberry Street, just before 9 am on a Wednesday morning to perform a welfare check.
Sadly, nothing could have prepared the responding officer for what they were about to see, even though the concerned family member had given the police a grim warning. According to the woman who alerted authorities, Meshey had told her that there was a severed head in his freezer and a cadaver in a bed in the home. As the officer arrived, she told him she had seen what she believed was the head of a family member in the freezer after she had personally checked inside the home.
The officer knocked on the door and questioned Meshey, who reported escorted the responding officer to the kitchen in his apartment. There, he removed what he claimed was part of a “cadaver doll” from the freezer, WGAL reported. On a white dinner plate that Meshey had removed from the freezer and presented to the officer sat a human head. At that point, the responding officer called for backup, and Meshey was taken to the Lancaster City Police Station to be questioned by detectives.
Unfortunately, things were about to get even more bizarre as Meshey told detectives that he had made a “disturbing” discovery in his dad’s bed. According to Meshey, he found a “cadaver doll” in his father’s bedroom early the previous morning. The “doll” sounded and looked like his father, Meshey explained during the police interview. He attacked the “doll,” he said, admitting to stabbing the “cadaver doll” in the chest for two to three minutes with an eight- or nine-inch knife. But, that wasn’t even the worst of it.
After stabbing the so-called “doll,” Meshey then used a hand saw to dismember the body before putting the severed parts, including the arms, legs, and head, in garbage bags, which he then placed in the basement, court documents allege. The following morning, he retrieved the head from the basement and put it in the kitchen freezer, police said.
Donald Meshey Jr then put the torso in a garbage bag and placed it in a footlocker before using a dolly to transport the footlocker outside, where he placed it in a car. By the time police received the call and performed the welfare check, “parts of the dismembered body” were found scattered “all over the house,” the Daily Mail reported.
The coroner later confirmed that the head was indeed human and it, as well as the other dismembered body parts, belonged to 67-year-old Donald Meshey — the suspect’s father, who had died of multiple stab wounds before being cut to pieces. Donald Meshey Jr was arrested for killing his father and dismembering his body. He was booked into the Lancaster County Prison and charged with criminal homicide, abuse of a corpse, and tampering with evidence.
Sadly, this wasn’t his first run-in with the law. Just six months prior to killing his father, “Meshey pushed a woman into some boxes, causing her minor injuries, at a home in Lancaster Township. He was charged with harassment and pleaded guilty May 5 before District Judge Mary Sponaugle,” Lancaster Online reported. “Sponaugle gave Meshey the option of enrolling in anger management counseling and completing six classes instead of paying a $50 fine and court costs of about $163.”
Donald Meshey Jr, who has been described as having “somewhat of a temper” and one whose “feathers could be ruffled a little easily,” either skipped the anger management option or failed to fulfill it, opting instead to pay the fines. This seems incredibly unfortunate for his father, who was described as “always nice” and “the sweetest guy,” and who might still be alive if his son was forced to get the mental health help he needed instead of receiving a slap on the wrist in the form of a small fine.
This case also speaks to another important issue. As we hear calls for more social workers and less law enforcement, remember this case and the words of Cpt. Michael Winters: “You can’t imagine running into something like this. Obviously, it’s a traumatic experience for anyone to experience, including police officers, so yeah, it’s a horrific scene.” Horrific and traumatic, indeed. Sadly, this is the kind of gruesome discoveries police must be prepared to encounter when performing a welfare check, and I’m not so sure that’s what our social workers signed up for.
