Investigators find 'possible connection' to human remains unearthed at Hungryland preserve
After St. Lucie County sheriff's deputies searched two homes in Port St. Lucie, investigators said they found a possible connection to the human remains found at a nature preserve last week in Martin County.
Martin County sheriff's investigators have said the remains, in three separate locations including a shallow grave, found at John C. and Mariana Jones/Hungryland Wildlife and Environmental Area March 11 are likely of 42-year-old Dustin Davis Mills.
The rural environmental area is more than 16,600 acres in Martin and Palm Beach counties off Southwest Pratt Whitney Road.
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Mills, who was released from state prison in February 2020, did not have a permanent address and was suspected to be living "couch-to-couch," Martin County Sheriff William Snyder said last week.
St. Lucie County sheriff's Chief Deputy Brian Hester did not elaborate Wednesday on what the suspected link to his death was, beyond saying a possible connection was found from one of the homes deputies examined Monday under a search warrant on Northeast Jettie Terrace in Port St. Lucie.
"Law enforcement officials from the St. Lucie County Sheriff’s Office, Martin County Sheriff’s Office and Port St. Lucie Police Department are investigating a possible connection between evidence found at Jettie Terrace and the human remains found in Martin County last week," Hester said in a written statement.
A prior search warrant operation and narcotics arrest at a home on Southwest Del Rio Boulevard led deputies to search the house on the 100 block of Northeast Jettie Terrace, Hester said.
Deputies arrested two men on narcotics-related charges at the home on Southwest Del Rio Boulevard.
Hester said information gathered from their search of that home led them to Northeast Jettie Terrace, where they found evidence possibly connected to Mills.
Hester did not specify what information was gathered from Southwest Del Rio Boulevard or if the two men arrested are involved in the Mills case.
The St. Lucie County chief deputy was unavailable for further comment Wednesday.
Deputies searched John C. and Mariana Jones/Hungryland Wildlife and Environmental Area on March 9 after a Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission biologist said she saw an alligator with a severed arm in its mouth.
Later that afternoon law enforcement officers found an arm on a canal bank about 3 miles west of Southwest Pratt Whitney Road, Snyder said. They found a leg in another location and a torso in a shallow grave.
Snyder said investigators don't know who saw Mills last and his contact with family was intermittent.
The Medical Examiner's office was able to link one of the body parts to Mills by a fingerprint test.
Mills was sentenced to prison in 1999 in St. Johns County, and again in 2004 in St. Lucie County, according to the state Department of Corrections.
In the 2004 case, most of the charges involved marijuana. He also was sentenced in 2018 in Broward County in connection with an offense involving battery on a law enforcement officer, firefighter or emergency repsonder, records show.
When Mills got out of prison in 2020, his listed residence upon release was 4700 W. Midway Road — the address of the St. Lucie County Sheriff’s Office.
Mauricio La Plante is a TCPalm breaking news reporter. Follow him on Twitter @mslaplantenews or email him at Mauricio.LaPlante@TCPalm.com.
This article originally appeared on Treasure Coast Newspapers: St. Lucie sheriff's office finds possible connection in human remains case
