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Five More Of John Wheeler's Last Hours Filled In; Delaware Death Still A Mystery

This image made from surveillance video provided by the Newark, Del. Police Dept. on Wednesday, Jan. 5, 2011 shows John P. Wheeler II inside the Newcastle County Courthouse parking garage, on Wednesday, Dec. 29, 2010, in Wilmington, Del. Wheeler appeared confused and disoriented.
AP
This image made from surveillance video provided by the Newark, Del. Police Dept. on Wednesday, Jan. 5, 2011 shows John P. Wheeler II inside the Newcastle County Courthouse parking garage, on Wednesday, Dec. 29, 2010, in Wilmington, Del. Wheeler appeared confused and disoriented.

"Newark [Del.] police reported Wednesday that John P. Wheeler III was spotted at 8:30 p.m. Dec. 30 as he wandered through a DuPont Co. building, apparently confused and disoriented -- filling in five more hours leading up to the discovery of his body in a Wilmington landfill," The News Journalof Wilmington reports this morning.

The newspaper adds that "the former Pentagon official's body was found about 13 hours later, on New Year's Eve, lying in refuse at Wilmington's Cherry Island Landfill."

As we reported yesterday, "sad tales" about the 66-year-old Wheeler's last days are coming to light. Before being spotted in the office building, he had been at a Wilmington parking facility looking for his car -- though it was parked blocks away. As we said, surveillance video shows him walking around holding a shoe in one hand. His death has been ruled a homicide, but authorities have not yet released a cause.

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Mark Memmott is NPR's supervising senior editor for Standards & Practices. In that role, he's a resource for NPR's journalists – helping them raise the right questions as they do their work and uphold the organization's standards.