The Lee County Sheriff's Office said the anthropologist was shopping at the store in North Fort Myers when they noticed a human skull in the Halloween section. "Based upon the observations of detectives on scene, the skull is believed to be that of a human," the Lee County Sheriff's Office said in a statement.
A state medical examiner will conduct testing on the skull to try to determine its origin. The sheriff's office says this case is not considered suspicious. The store owner reportedly told authorities that the skull was in a storage unit that was purchased years ago. This is not the first time a human skull has turned up at a thrift store in recent months.
In September, a human skull was found among donations at a Goodwill location in the Phoenix area. It was reportedly placed into a donation box over a weekend. “It did not ever make it to the floor. It was in the donation box, again, with other taxidermy items,” Lisa Berry, public information officer for the Goodyear Police Department, told Scripps News Phoenix.Authorities in Arizona added that the skull did not appear to be associated with any crime.