When a Lycoming Regional police officer arrived at Debra Hiller’s home at 38 Catherine Drive in Old Lycoming Township on Aug. 29, Douglas Eugene Goodwin answered the door.

The officer told the 34-year-old Goodwin he was checking on Hiller’s welfare.

“Honesty, I’ve been wondering too. I haven’t seen her,” the 32-year-old Goodwin told the officer.

However, as the officer walked past the kitchen, down a hallway towards the 66-year-old woman’s bedroom, “he began to smell an odor he recognized as a decomposing body,” it was stated in an affidavit filed by Detective Justin Segura of the Lycoming Regional police. Hiller was found dead in the bedroom, police said.

When asked if he knew that Hiller was dead, he said he did not, but he “was aware she had medical issues. He told the officer that he had provided her with two pills when she returned home from the hospital on Aug. 22,” Segura said in the affidavit.

A representative from the Lycoming County Coroner’s Office responded to the scene. It was estimated the woman had been dead for about a week, Segura said.

Hiller’s body was taken to the Forensic Center at UPMC Williamsport. It was determined that Hiller died of natural causes, a deputy coroner said Wednesday.

Goodwin, who was listed as homeless on a criminal complaint, was arrested Wednesday morning at the home of his grandfather on Janet Avenue in Old Lycoming Township on a single misdemeanor count of abuse of corpse. He had been staying with his grandfather for about two months, he told District Judge William Solomon during his arraignment.

Goodwin had been staying at Hiller’s home “for a few weeks,” including several days after she died there, Segura alleged in the affidavit.

Neighbors had seen Goodwin “coming and going from Hiller’s residence, but had not seen her,” the officer stated in the court document.

When a caseworker came to the home to check on Hiller after her discharge from the hospital, Goodwin turned the caseworker away, telling him he hadn’t seen her, Segura said. When the caseworker asked for his identity, Goodwin refused, telling him “I know my rights. I don’t have to tell you that,” it was stated in the affidavit.

At his arraignment, Goodwin told Solomon that he has struggled with several mental health issues. He has been released on $5,000 bail.