During the ongoing search for Middlebury College student Lia Smith, members of the Vermont State Police Search and Rescue Team located a body in a field west of campus at about 1:30 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 23. The location is in the town of Cornwall near The Knoll, the college’s organic farm.
Police secured the area, and the Vermont State Police began a death investigation. The body will be brought to the Chief Medical Examiner’s Office in Burlington for an autopsy to confirm identity and determine the cause and manner of death. The autopsy is expected to be performed Friday, Oct. 24.
Police did not specify the corpse identity. Initial investigation does not indicate that the death is suspicious.
State police investigators are leading the death investigation with assistance from the Middlebury Police Department and in coordination with the Vermont Attorney General’s Office. VSP will withhold the identity of the deceased individual until after the autopsy.