Woman Dies Trapped In Clothing Donation Bin In Petaluma

PETALUMA, CA — Petaluma police were on scene Wednesday morning where a 30-year-old woman's body was discovered partially inside a clothing donation bin. As emergency personnel responded, passerby saw a yellow plastic cover draped over the large green box, which is in a parking lot at 5155 Old Redwood Highway, between Steel Bear Deli/convenience store and Valero gas station near U.S. Highway 101 and N. McDowell Boulevard.

The Sonoma County Sheriff-Coroner's office has since identified the deceased as Kaily Land, 30, of Petaluma.

The Petaluma Police Department was first alerted to the death at 6:39 a.m., and officers arrived to find the woman unresponsive. They tried to free her from the container while Petaluma Fire Department personnel checked her for signs of life, police officials said in a statement issued early Wednesday afternoon.

Petaluma Police Department sent its mobile command unit to the scene and cordoned off the area with yellow crime tape.

At about 8:15 a.m., officers were seen talking to a man who was sitting on a curb down the street.

The body was initially reported by a delivery man who called 911 when he saw what appeared to be a woman's body hanging out of the clothes donation box.

She became fatally trapped head first in the container, police said.

"It appeared that the female subject had partially entered the container at an unknown time and attempted to retrieve items from inside before becoming trapped in the container doors," police said.

The woman's air supply may have been cut off when she was crushed by the doors around the neck, Petaluma police Lt. Tim Lyons said.

Sonoma County sheriff-coroner's officials responded and helped remove Land's body from the container. She was then pronounced deceased at the scene.

Police were calling it an "unattended death," saying there was no evidence indicating it was "anything other than a tragic accident."

The coroner's office identified the deceased Thursday as Kaily Land, 30, of Petaluma.

Coroner's officials will conduct an autopsy to confirm Land's cause of death.

Lyons previously confirmed the body was that of an adult female, and said they were working to determine whether she may have been a transient.

"We're still not sure about that," Lyons told Patch.

Part of Old Redwood Highway and some adjacent parking lots were temporarily blocked Wednesday morning "due to the large amount of emergency vehicles which responded to this incident and the location of the crime scene itself," police said.

Bay City News Service contributed to this report.

Photos by Al Francis/Napasonomaphotos.com