A woman was arrested after police found her mother’s decomposing body inside a freezer in the garage of their Chicago apartment building.
Eva Bratcher, 69, who reportedly hid her mother’s body in the freezer for nearly two years, was charged on Thursday for concealing the death of 96-year-old Regina Michalski’s death and possessing a fraudulent identification card.
Sabrina Watson, Bratcher’s daughter who lives in Kentucky, called Chicago police on Monday to do a wellness check on her grandmother.
Watson reportedly told dispatchers, “I hope I’m wrong, but I doubt she’s alive at 96. So, could you please, just go to the property and knock on the door or look around?”
Police then discovered Michalski’s body in the garage freezer of the two-flat apartment building she shared with Bratcher. Investigators believe Michalski died in March 2021.
Investigators are looking into whether Bratcher was collecting Michalski’s Social Security benefits after her death. Watson believes Bratcher was motivated by money to hide her grandmother’s death.
“It’s always been money. She would steal my identity for money. She did it to my sister. She did it to my husband,” Watson said.
Before police discovered Michalski’s body, Bratcher would make up lies to explain her mother’s absence to neighbors.
“She was telling different neighbors different stories,” Brigette Yanez, who lived in the two-flat building, told a local outlet.
“Like some people, she was saying she was in a nursing home in Wisconsin. To other people, she had already passed away. And to me, she was still talking about her, like she was still alive.”
Judge David Kelly set a $20,000 bond for Bratcher and called the allegations “very disturbing.”
Bratcher has a criminal past that includes felony forgery convictions as well as charges of battery and assault. She is scheduled to return to court on Feb. 21.
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