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CARBONVILLE, Carbon County — A man was arrested Tuesday for investigation of murder after sheriff's deputies say his brother's decomposing body was found in a room sealed off with plastic sheeting and duct tape.
The bizarre set of circumstances started about 9:20 a.m. Tuesday when deputies were called to a mobile home at 1711 N. Carbonville Road, where a neighbor spotted a hose running from the back of a pickup truck to the home, said Carbon County Sheriff's Chief Deputy Tom Stefanoff.
A deputy entered the mobile home and found Curt Alan Morris, 55, unresponsive on a bedroom floor, Stefanoff said. Deputies and paramedics were able to revive him and asked whether anyone else lived in the home.
"He said his brother did, but his brother was at work," Stefanoff said. "He then changed his story and said the brother was inside."
A deputy re-entered the home and found a second bedroom that had plastic sheeting over the door and was sealed by duct tape. Inside the bedroom, deputies found the body of Jack Roger Morris, 50, on a bed with a gunshot wound to the head.
"He'd been dead at least a week or more," Stefanoff said.
He'd been dead at least a week or more.
–Tom Stefanoff
On Wednesday, the men's neighbors reacted to the gruesome discovery with shock.
"That just grosses me out," said neighbor Gina Hayward. "It trips me out because (Curt Morris) was a quiet man."
The brothers stayed home all the time and kept to themselves, she said.
Neighbor Darrell Duncan said he has lived in the mobile home park since May and wasn't even aware the Morrises' trailer was occupied.
"We didn't even know anybody lived there," he said. "Life's stranger than fiction."
After Curt Morris was released from the hospital Tuesday, he was questioned by detectives, arrested and then booked into the Carbon County Jail for investigation of murder. He is being held without bail.
The Morris brothers, who reportedly have family in Colorado, had been living together on and off for a couple of years, Stefanoff said.
A long gun was recovered from the trailer home by detectives, but investigators are waiting on the results of an autopsy and ballistics tests before confirming that it was the weapon used to kill Jack Morris.
Curt Morris is cooperating with the investigation, although he did initially give detectives an alias, Stefanoff said.
The case is expected to be reviewed by the Carbon County Attorney's Office this week for possible criminal charges.
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