The former home of late Argentine pop star Gustavo Cerati has become the center of a gruesome mystery after human remains were found buried during construction work in the property.

On May 20th, construction workers unearthed a set of human bones during the demolition of a house on Congreso avenue in the Coghlan neighborhood of Buenos Aires. They subsequently called 911, prompting a judicial investigation that is being led by the 61st Criminal and Correctional Prosecution Office headed by Martín López Perrando. 

While police sources indicated to the Herald that the investigation remains under judicial secrecy, several Argentine outlets have reported that early forensic analysis showed the remains would correspond to an adult male in his 20s, and that some personal items that were found along with the body indicate that he was buried approximately thirty years ago.

A former frontman of Soda Stereo, Latin America’s most popular pop-rock band in the 1980s and 1990s, Cerati rented the house between 2001 and 2003. The musician, who developed a hugely successful solo career after the band’s break up, passed away in 2014 after spending several years in a coma due to a stroke he suffered following a show in Caracas, Venezuela in 2010. 

Artist Marina Olmi, the owner of the house, said in an interview with TN network that she and her ex-husband had purchased the property more than thirty years ago from a German woman named Olga Schuddekopf. 

“She told us that the place had previously been a nursing home and a chapel before that, but that was over 150 years ago,” she explained.  

Olmi also said the lot had two houses, a main one in the front, and a smaller one in the back, which Cerati used as a working space.

According to forensic sources, further analysis of the remains are underway to determine their specific age range, gender, height and any potential ante- or peri-mortem injuries.

With information from Ámbito