Brian Porter, 32, was cold to the touch when officers found him, according to the report.
During questioning Charles Rucker, the resident of the apartment, at first denied having any visitors the night before and said he had been sleeping at a neighbor’s for the night.
When Officer Wayne Birch took Rucker outside and showed him the deceased man, Rucker said he had been in his apartment, according to the police report.
During further questioning at the police station, Rucker said that on Friday afternoon Porter and a woman came to his residence and began shooting up with heroin, according to the report.
Rucker told police the woman left, and he left Porter sitting on the couch, according to the report.
When Rucker returned to the apartment Saturday morning he said he found Porter unconscious and not breathing .
“(Rucker) advised that he attempted to give Brian chest compressions with no success,” the police reports states. “Once he realized that Brian had died, he then picked him up off the couch and dragged him outside, then tossed him in the bushes in front of the apartment complex.”
Rucker told police he moved Porter because he didn’t want to get blamed for his death.
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Detectives charged Rucker with tampering with evidence, a third-degree felony, and abuse of a corpse and permitting drug abuse, both misdemeanors.
A search of the residence turned up six syringes, according to police.
Rucker is housed in the Middletown City Jail and is scheduled to appear in municipal court next week for a preliminary hearing.
The Butler County Coroner’s Office has not yet ruled Porter’s cause of death, but Middletown police Lt. Scott Reeve said there is no reason to believe it was anything other than an overdose.
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This is the second Middletown case in two months involving people allegedly dumping bodies after an overdose.
In August, Erica Robinson, 32 and Joshua Swenson, 28, both of 2912 Wilbraham Road, were arrested after Leslie Dalton’s body was found dumped in nearby woods.
The duo told police that the 20-year-old woman overdosed in their house and they waited until night before putting her body in a wheelbarrow, covering it with a sheet and then pushing her body across the street to the woods.
Dalton, who police believe had been missing for several weeks, was found dead in a dry creek bed Aug. 13. Her body was badly decomposed, police said.
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Robinson and Swenson were indicted by a Butler County grand jury in September on charges of tampering with evidence and gross abuse of a corpse, both felonies.
They are free on bond and scheduled to be in Butler County Common Pleas Courtlater this month for a pretrial hearing.
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