Terrance Smith, 49, has been charged with abandonment of a corpse
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NEED TO KNOW
- A Missouri woman’s body was found decomposing in her apartment — and her roommate has since been charged with abandonment of a corpse
- The body of Lawanda McGee, a nursing school graduate, was discovered in her apartment on Jan. 21
- Police believe she may have died on or around Dec. 15, and her roommate, 49-year-old Terrance Smith, covered her body with blankets and opened windows after her death
A Missouri woman's body was found decomposing in her apartment — and her roommate has since been charged.
The body of the woman — identified by family as Lawanda McGee — was discovered at her Dragonwyck Drive apartment in St. Louis on Jan. 21 by St. Louis County Police after officials received a call for a welfare check, according to a criminal complaint reviewed by PEOPLE.
Police believe her body had been sitting in the apartment for weeks — and McGee's roommate, 49-year-old Terrance Smith, is now facing a charge of abandonment of a corpse.
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According to the complaint, McGee's cousin, as well as her apartment building's manager, had requested the welfare check after she had not been seen for weeks.
"Investigation revealed that neighbors had not seen her since mid-December 2025, was behind on her rent, and her last Facebook post was on December 15, 2025," the court document reads, adding that McGee's body had been decomposing for some time.
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"Police learned the defendant was observed at the apartment the night before, and his personal items were in the apartment," per the document.
By Feb. 2, Smith returned to the apartment complex, and the building's leasing office notified police, who arrested him soon after.
McGee's sister, Ashley Barrett, told KSDK and wrote on a GoFundMe page that McGee was a recent nursing school graduate and a mother to a 13-year-old daughter.
St. Louis County Justic Center
"She had just graduated from nursing school, so we were excited to see what she was preparing us for," Barrett wrote on the GoFundMe, which was set up to assist with funeral expenses and support for McGee's daughter. "Lawanda was just starting to get ahead of life when she passed away."
Barrett said she hadn't spoken to her sister since early December, but she didn't become worried that something was wrong until other relatives shared that they hadn't heard from her.
"I started calling the hospitals, you know, every hospital in St. Louis, just to figure out, hey, was she in the hospital? And then I started calling other places just to see if maybe she was in other places. And then I'm thinking to myself, 'She wouldn't be dead, because I would have gotten a phone call,' " Barrett said.
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Police told Barrett that her sister may have died on or around Dec. 15, and the family is now awaiting toxicology results to determine McGee's cause of death.
"[Smith] sat with her for 38 days and just walked past her every day. He covered her with blankets. He tried to air the place out so no one could smell it," Barrett said. "She didn't deserve that."
Smith was charged on Feb. 2, and his bond was set at $100,000, according to KSDK.
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