JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — JSO is working to figure out how a car caught fire inside a grocery store parking lot and kill a person.
JSO is considering the incident a suicide investigation. Previously, JSO and the Jacksonville Fire and Rescue Department had considered this incident a homicide investigation.
Firefighters found the body in a car fire on Tuesday morning in a Winn Dixie parking lot on Monument Road.
“I heard this big boom and I looked up and it was a small car and big flames and fire and a whole bunch of black smoke,” said La Vern Wilson, a witness who says she saw the flames on her way to work.
“I almost jumped off the side of the sidewalk because it was so loud.,” she described. “It kinda scared me because I was walking with my head down and then when I looked up, it was just this big old giant flame. Real high. So, yeah, it was pretty scary.”
JFRD dispatch initially responded to 1531 Monument Rd. in reference to a car fire. Upon extinguishing the fire, emergency personnel located a body within the vehicle, and the JSO Homicide Unit was contacted.
The parking lot is currently blocked off for investigation.