A former Georgia Bureau of Investigation employee is under fire after it was discovered that he took a gruesome picture posing with a victim’s decapitated head and circulated it around his office like it was a prize, WSBTV reports.
The victim, Robert Page, a 76-year-old grandfather went missing in November and it was later found that 25-year-old Christian Ponce-Martinez, dismembered and hid the man’s body, the station reports. Ponce-Martinez was charged with malice murder.
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Page’s body was found in a neighbor’s home in Morrow.
Police were able to pinpoint the killer after reviewing a neighbor’s surveillance video. A GBI employee who was investigating the gruesome murder took a picture with Page’s head and showed the photo to other employees in his office.
“The GBI’s position on this is it was highly inappropriate and it’s been addressed,” said GBI spokesperson Nelly Miles.
To avoid being fired, the employee quit and so did the employee who took the grisly image.
Page’s family, however, is outraged that the employee was given the option to quit in lieu of being fired.
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“Visually trying to see my father’s head in a cooler is enough. But now you take it and you take pictures with it?” said Page’s daughter, Reba Sanchez.
“You taking pictures, making light of a situation like that? I mean, you’re just as evil to me as that murderer.”
Sanchez is struggling to understand the former employee’s actions.
“That’s someone’s loved one. You wouldn’t want anyone to do that to your family member. So why would you do it to mine,” Sanchez said.
“It’s awful that somebody would be that evil,” said Page’s widow, Lula Page. She said she was disturbed when she heard that the photo existed.
The GBI has now enacted a policy that prohibits pictures from being taken of victims in the medical examiner’s office.
Watch more in the clip below.
