An Eatonton man whose body was discovered in his vehicle last week died of natural causes, authorities say.
Around 10 p.m. Tuesday, June 3, a passerby along the 100 block of Crooked Creek Drive noticed a 2015 Nissan Titan down in the woods off the roadway and called the Putnam County Sheriff’s Office. When deputies arrived, they found 35-year-old Nicholas Justin Dempsey in the driver’s seat; he appeared to have died a few hours earlier, said Putnam County Sheriff Howard Sills.
“It looks like his truck clipped a mailbox before it ran off down in the woods,” Sills said the next day. “But the damage to the vehicle and the impact shouldn’t have killed him.”
Putnam County Coroner Hollis Harrison took Dempsey’s body to the Georgia Bureau of Investigation Medical Examiner’s Office for an autopsy. The autopsy results revealed Dempsey died from a medical episode, Harrison said.
Dempsey was a landscaping superintendent at Yellowstone Landscape in Eatonton, according to his obituary. He loved camping, hunting at Oconee Wildlife Management Area in White Plains, and fishing on Lake Sinclair with his family. His family will be celebrating his life on Sunday, June 15, at Williams Funeral Home.
The obituary can be viewed on Page A6 of this week’s edition.