The Town of Ramapo Police have called the midnight car fire at the end of Waldron Terrace in Sloatsburg “definitely suspicious.”
Matt Spillane and Steve Lieberman covered the incident for The Journal News and were at the scene Tuesday morning when the Sloatsburg Volunteer Ambulance Corps arrived to claim the body of a deceased man. According to police, the Sloatsburg Volunteer Fire Department called in the incident at 12:20 a.m. Tuesday morning, June 21.
Ossen Lavaud, a 48-year-old Middletown man was found dead Tuesday morning outside a burning car along a dirt road in the Village of Sloatsburg.
Ramapo Police Brad Weidel said investigators were trying to figure out whether any hazardous materials were in the car, how it caught fire, and how Lavaud got out of it.
— According to Lohud reporters Matt Spillane and Steve Lieberman
According to the Lohud report, “first responders arrived and found a four-door sedan on fire, with a man burned outside the car. He was pronounced dead at the scene.”
Ramapo police Chief Brad Weidel said: “We have a death with a burned body. We have a burned vehicle. We don’t know how all that came about.”
Sloatsburg, New York: 48-year-old Middletown man found dead outside burned car https://t.co/MMH8wr8xOC
— Queen P (@4Prina) June 21, 2016
#DEADLYCARFIRE A man is found dead from a car fire on the property of a waste water treatment plant in #Sloatsburg https://t.co/jJXNryT0NL
— Richard Giacovas (@RichardGNews12) June 21, 2016
Waldron Terrace is a neighborhood unto itself in Sloatsburg, bordered on one side by the NYS Thruway and the other by the Ramapo River. The incident took place in a wooded property at the end of Waldron near the service road that leads to the NYS Thruway.
According to the Lohud report, police have made a preliminary identification of the body but the exact cause of death is being investigated by the Rockland County Medical Examiner’s office.
**Fatal MVF** (OOA, delayed 00:26hrs) Sloatsburg (Rockland) Waldron Terrace, services oper… https://t.co/nEfIW6CNk1 pic.twitter.com/piiRpLL7Hd
— Kempter’s Fire Wire (@KempterFireWire) June 21, 2016