New Details In Roommate Death

David Schwede

Dearborn County Law Enforcement

 Center

(Lawrenceburg, Ind.) - A Lawrenceburg man was dead for two days before the man who was supposed to be his caretaker called 911.

That’s just a portion of the grim details given in a probable cause affidavit filed Monday for the arrest of David F. Schwede, the man taken into police custody after John Chenault was found dead in his unit at Tuscany Bay Apartments on November 9.

Schwede, 47, and Chenault, 50, were roommates in the apartment. Schwede moved to Dearborn County from Michigan and met Chenault when both were residents of the Heart House homeless shelter in Aurora.

Schwede told investigators with the Lawrenceburg Police Department that he and Chenault decided about seven months ago to get an apartment together. Chenault, a blind diabetic deaf in one ear, needed a caretaker.

After living together in the apartment for some time, Schwede became delinquent in paying the rent.

A friend of Chenault’s, Sharon Starr, told investigators the roommates’ relationship also became strained months earlier when Schwede, who did not have a valid driver’s license, wrecked and totaled Chenault’s uninsured automobile.

On the afternoon of Wednesday, November 9, Schwede called 911 reporting that Chenault was unconscious, but still breathing. The EMTs found him dead in his bedroom for what had apparently been for some time.

Schwede advised later during a police interview that he had last spoken with Chenault at about 11:00 that morning. Detectives advised that it appeared he had been deceased longer than that.

He advised that Chenault had not been eating well aside from a pork chop he had prepared his roommate the prior evening.

Starr later advised detectives the last time she saw Chenault alive was Friday, November 4. She spoke to him again on the phone on Sunday evening, November 6 saying he sounded in a good mood.

More calls from Starr to Chenault starting on Monday, November 7 were never returned. She told police she assumed he had gone to the hospital.

Starr eventually called Schwede on the morning of Wednesday, November 9. Schwede allegedly told her that Chenault was sleeping. She received a call back from Schwede about three hours later informing her that he found Chenault in his bed deceased.

After interviewing Starr, detectives spoke again with Schwede. He admitted he had been lieing and that Chenault had been dead since Monday night, November 7, nearly 48 hours before the 911 call.

According to the affidavit, “Throughout the course of the interview, Schwede made the following statements to your affiant: that he killed him (Chenault), he watched him (Chenault) die, there was a physical altercation, that he held him (Chenault) just long enough, that it was his fault, that he should go to jail and that he was sorry and wishes he could take it back.”

Since his arrest, Schwede has been held at the Dearborn County Law Enforcement Center on a preliminary charge of Murder. The list of formal charges filed against him on Monday include Neglect of a Dependant Resulting in Serious Bodily Injury (Class B felony), False Reporting (Class A misdemeanor), and Failure to Report a Dead Body (Class A misdemeanor).

The affidavit notes that an autopsy performed on Chenault’s body November 11 were inconclusive, pending results of a toxicology tests.

Schwede was ordered held on $150,000 surety and $2,500 cash bond after appearing in Dearborn Circuit Court Tuesday afternoon.

LINKS:

Person of Interest Held In L'burg Man's Death

Murder At L'burg Apartment Complex