A New Jersey postal worker who discovered three bodies at a home along his Friday delivery route said Saturday that a disturbing note on the door appeared to warn him about the deaths inside.
Dom Clements told The Post that he was delivering mail in Mount Holly when he noticed a cryptic message taped to the door of the dilapidated house: “9-1-1 Inside.” Beneath the words were crude drawings of two sad faces with Xs over their eyes.
“I thought it was weird, because the only person who would have been able to see that sign would have been me, ’cause I’m the only one who goes to that house every day,” Clements said. “Nobody else could see it from outside.”
The home’s mailbox had also been wrapped in clear tape—the same kind of tape used to secure the unsettling note beside the door, Clements said.
“The only person who goes up to the door is the mail carrier,” he said. “It’s weird. The whole situation was weird. I definitely don’t want it to happen again.”
Responding officers found a bloody scene inside and discovered the bodies of three “elderly” people, according to Burlington County prosecutors. The victims’ identities and causes of death have not been released as authorities await autopsy results.
A neighbor said a group of brothers and sisters had lived in the home.
The person who left the note for Clements drew only two “rudimentary” faces, despite the discovery of three bodies.
“Two fit exactly on the picture. That’s all he had room for. It was an 8.5-by-11 sheet, like a regular sheet of paper,” Clements recalled.
Clements said he believed three or four people lived in the deteriorating house, which had peeling paint and rotting window frames. From his brief interactions with them, he said, they appeared to be “nice people,” although the neglected property stood out among the well-kept homes in the modest Philadelphia suburb.
A longtime resident who frequently walked past the home on Winding Way was out for a stroll when Clements made the grim discovery. He asked her for advice before calling 911.
The woman, who declined to give her name, told The Post that four brothers and sisters lived in the house and generally kept to themselves.
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“We’ve been here 50-some years. They were here before us, but they pretty much stayed by themselves,” she said.
She said one of the sisters had worked as a crossing guard for years, a role that brought her into contact with the woman’s children during parades and other town events.
“The one brother was like clockwork. He would always walk down to 7-Eleven around 2:30 or 3 and then walk back,” she said. “I think he would get lottery tickets and something to drink. Other than that, they barely left the house, and none of them drove.”
The longtime resident described the area as a “quiet neighborhood” and said she had never heard reports of violence. However, she noticed something unusual when she passed the home Tuesday.
“Tuesday is our trash day,” she said. “I saw someone coming out of the house. In all the years I’ve been here, I’ve never seen anybody come in or go out of the house, except for the man who walks to 7-Eleven.”
“It was trash day, and he had a bag in his hand. He took it down to the curb and placed it next to another container.
“It was just a little bag. He put it down and walked away. He was dressed all in black, just walking down the street. He didn’t take it to a car; he just kept walking.”
Clements said he remained shaken by what he found.
“That sign is so bizarre. It just felt weird. I was like, ‘Ooh, that doesn’t— that’s not something that happens every day,’” he said.
“It’s the first time I’ve ever seen anything like that.”
The Burlington County Medical Examiner’s Office did not immediately respond to The Post’s request for comment Sunday morning.