A homeless man was found dead near Travis and Anita Street in Midtown this week. Police estimated that his body had been there for 20 hours, KHOU reports. Yet no one called for help.
Instead, witnesses tell detectives they saw people taking cellphone photos of the homeless man's half-naked body.
"If they just had used their cellphone to make a call instead of a picture, perhaps this man could still be alive today."
"If they just had used their cellphone to make a call instead of a picture, perhaps this man could still be alive today," Sgt. Brian Harris of the Houston Police Department tells KHOU's Tim Wetzel.
"I would like to say our city is better than that, I know our city is better than that."
Alice Davis, a woman working at a business down the street from where the man was found, said she knew the man as "Big Guy."
"He would come in and say, 'Can I get a quarter? Can I have a cup of coffee?' Sometimes he would ask to use the bathroom," Davis said. "I'm thinking the man was asleep, so nobody knew he was really dead."
Police believe the man died of natural causes. The medical examiner will determine his identity and attempt to notify his family.
Police said that the homeless man had probably been lying on the ground for 20 hours and no one called for help.
