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Body Found at L.A. Plant May Be Inmate : Crime: Corpse is found in steel drum picked up from Norco prison. Officials say one prisoner is missing.

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TIMES STAFF WRITER

Workers preparing to dump the contents of a steel drum of kitchen wastes into a processing machine at a rendering plant in South-Central Los Angeles on Thursday discovered a corpse that may be the body of an inmate missing from a state prison in Norco, police said.

The unidentified man, who police said appeared to be a Latino in his mid-30s, was found in a sealed drum Thursday morning at Darling Delaware Co., a plant that recycles meat fat, grease and bones for use in products such as pet food.

The contents of the drum were about to be emptied into a pit where a blade separates the tallow and bone, police said.

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Drivers told police that the drum was picked up, along with several others, from the California Rehabilitation Center in Norco about 6:30 a.m. Thursday. The truck made about three or four more pickups before arriving at the plant at 2626 E. 25th St., police said.

According to Lt. Annette Hissami, a public information officer at the prison, the facility houses 3,935 male inmates and 826 female inmates.

Hissami said personnel had been alerted to a possible escape earlier Thursday, and a head count of prisoners indicated that a man was missing.

“At this time it has not been confirmed (that the dead man was a prisoner), but we are missing one male inmate,” Hissami said. She said she could not speculate on how the body got into the drum, which contained wastes from the prison kitchen.

Authorities declined to release the name of the missing inmate pending an investigation.

The prison is classified as a Level 2 security facility with open dormitories, secured perimeter fences and armed guards, said Gerri Loser, spokeswoman for the state Department of Corrections in Sacramento.

The Riverside County coroner’s office is attempting to determine how the man died.

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