Photo: FBI
The FBI has identified the woman whose body was found stuffed in a trash bag and floating off the Gulf Coast in Florida. The body has been identified as 34-year-old Heather Rose Strickland, the agency's Tampa Field Office announced on Friday, December 16.
Strickland was last seen leaving HCA Florida Largo Hospital in Largo on Monday, December 5, according to the FBI. On December 10, the U.S. Coast Guard got a call around noon from a group of fishermen discovering the body 13 miles off the coast of Pinellas County. Officials say the corpse was wrapped in bedding and trucked inside a plastic bag.
Strickland is originally from the North Florida region and has been living in the Clearwater-St. Petersburg area for five years. Her parents, John and Sherrie Strickland, told WFLA they were informed about their daughter's passing on December 13. According to them, they've been trying to get her to move back home to seek treatment for mental health issues and drug addiction.
“We love her very much. She was a kind person,” John Strickland said. “She had some problems with mental illness, but she was a kind person, and no person deserves that.”
Investigators have called Strickland's death "suspicious" and are awaiting a toxicology report to determine her cause of death, reporters said. If you know anything regarding this case, contact the Tampa Field Office at (813) 253-1000, or you can submit a tip online at tips.fbi.gov.