Police: No remains in car buried behind California mansion linked to massive SJ fraud case

ATHERTON, Calif. — Crews fully excavated a car that police said was buried 30 years ago in the backyard of a Northern California mansion linked to one of San Joaquin County’s largest-ever insurance fraud schemes and found no human remains, authorities said Monday.

The convertible Mercedes Benz filled with bags of unused concrete was discovered last week by landscapers in the affluent town of Atherton in Silicon Valley.

Cadaver dogs brought to the scene made "slight" notifications of possible human remains on three separate occasions, police said in a statement.

The car was removed from the home by a tow truck and transported Saturday to the San Mateo County Crime Lab for further inspection and processing. On Sunday, ground penetrating radar was used to examine the scene, the department said.

"This examination did not reveal anything unusual or suspicious at the scene and no human remains were located," it said.

"This concluded our on-scene investigation," the department added.

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Police have not said who owned the car, which was reported stolen in nearby Palo Alto in September 1992, or who might have buried it in the backyard of the sprawling mansion. Police said Monday they had no further comment.

Investigators believe the car was buried 4 to 5 feet in the home's backyard sometime in the 1990s — before the current owners bought the home.

Atherton police said the possible owner of the car is believed to be deceased but officials were waiting for DMV records to confirm that.

Authorities wouldn't say if investigators believe the vehicle was registered to Johnny Bocktune Lew, who built the home and lived there with his family in the 1990s. Lew had a history of arrests for murder, attempted murder and insurance fraud.

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In 1999, Lew was accused of recruiting people from San Joaquin County to destroy his yacht, a sleek vessel more than 50 feet long, officials said. He paid undercover officers $30,000 in cash and gold watches valued at $20,000 to sink a $1.2 million yacht in part of an alleged insurance fraud scheme in what was at the time considered the largest single case of insurance fraud the state had seen, San Joaquin County authorities told The Record in 1999.

KRON-TV reported Monday that the car has a personalized license plate that includes "Lew."

Lew died in Washington state in 2015, a year after the family sold the house, his daughter, Jacq Searle, told the San Francisco Chronicle.

In the 1960s, Lew was found guilty of murdering a 21-year-old woman in Los Angeles County. He was released from prison after the California Supreme Court reversed the conviction in 1968, citing hearsay evidence that should not have been allowed at trial. Records showed that in 1977 Lew was convicted of two counts of attempted murder, also in Los Angeles County, and spent three years in prison, the Chronicle reported, citing court records.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

This article originally appeared on The Record: No body in buried car at California mansion linked to huge fraud case