Woman's Body Found in Suitcase Along North Carolina River

Police have found a woman's body stuffed in a suitcase near the Neuse River in Raleigh, North Carolina, where a pregnant woman went missing four days ago.

The authorities were contacted by a witness who reported seeing the body near the shoreline of the river around 11 a.m. Monday, ABC11 WTVD reported.

Police are working to confirm the identity of the victim, and the case is being treated as a homicide. "It's not every day, it's not every morning that you find what could be a person's body in a suitcase, in a river," Wake County Sheriff Gerald Baker said. He said it was "safe to say this was no accident."

Baker said they had not yet confirmed the identity of the body. The police are waiting for the autopsy report from the State Medical Examiner’s Office.

Over the weekend, a 28-year-old woman was reported missing from the area. Brittany Samone Smith, who was pregnant, was last seen near Fox Run Drive in Wendell. According to neighbors, she had been living in a tent with her boyfriend before she disappeared.

The family of the missing woman, who was present at the scene, believes the body might belong to Smith.

"We're going to work very hard. We're going to find out who was responsible. I can tell you that. Because these things just don't happen. Someone is responsible. If this is, in fact, the young lady that we've been looking for all weekend, someone is responsible for that," said Baker.

Smith, who was reported missing over the weekend, was homeless and had been living behind the house of Dale Williams of Wendell. He said he allowed Smith and her boyfriend to stay after the couple got rousted from a home where they were squatting.

"They obtained a tent, and they asked if they could pitch it here. Brittany‘s grandmother bought her a space heater, and we ran a drop line to an outlet so they could have heat. I’ve been doing their laundry, and they come into the shower," said Williams.

Although the couple had fights, her boyfriend could not be responsible for her disappearance. "I think it’s kind of ludicrous to implicate him because he doesn’t drive," Williams said. "He doesn’t have a car."