Collier deputies say 3 people found fatally shot in car near Ochopee

Three people were found shot to death in a car parked on the side of U.S. 41 East near Ochopee on Thursday.

Collier County deputies responded to a call of the bodies found in the 54000 block of U.S. 41 shortly after noon, said Sheriff's Office spokeswoman Kristine Gill.

"We're conducting a death investigation," she said.

James Bronson, 63, of Miami, said he noticed the parked car, a black Chevy Malibu, across U.S. 41 East from his property Thursday morning. The car was on grass next to the road and remained there into the evening hours as authorities investigated the scene.

A blue tarp and law enforcement vehicles blocked the car from onlookers.

"The car was already here at 9:30," Bronson said. "And I just thought it was a broke-down car."

Bronson, who spends Thursday through Sunday at his property near the southeastern edges of Collier County, said he passed the car in his swamp buggy when he left to help a friend install a part on his buggy. As he passed it, he could see somebody sitting in the driver's seat.

"I looked in and I could see it looked like a woman," he said. "I thought she was sleeping."

When he returned about 10:45 a.m., Bronson got his mail from his mailbox about two car lengths away from where the Malibu was parked. He decided to take a closer look at the car.

"It's been several hours, I figured they'd been sleeping, they should go wake up by now," Bronson said. "I went and knocked on the window, and there was no movement. So I looked inside and I could see that there was something bad wrong, you know, I could see blood. So I knew something was wrong."

Bronson then called 911.

"They wanted to make sure that they weren't sleeping, and I said, 'No, this don't look good,' " he said.

Bronson said deputies told him there were two dead people in the back seat in addition to the dead woman he saw sitting in the driver's seat. He said he couldn't see the bodies in the back because of the car's tinted windows.

"They said it's a Miami car," he said, adding that he told dispatchers the car's tag.

Cars breaking down by the side of the road isn't uncommon in the remote area near Ochopee, Bronson said.

"All kinds of things happen out here like that," he said. "Flat tires and overheating, but this here was the first time we ever had anything like this."

On Thursday afternoon, more than a dozen cars and trucks from the Sheriff's Office and the crime scene investigation department lined the road. U.S. 41 remained open but was down to one lane.

Deputies wearing reflective neon yellow vests directed traffic, with orange cones and yellow tape cordoning off the side of the road where the car was parked.

Investigators searched the sides of U.S. 41 with metal detectors and canvassed the wooded area behind the blue tent that covered the black Chevy where the bodies were found.

A Sheriff's Office helicopter circled overhead as classic rock played from a radio on Bronson's property.

"I'm from Miami,," Bronson said. "It happens like this all the time in Miami. But out here, it was, you know, hate to see it out here."