A 59-year-old California woman was found dead and buried in the backyard of a neighbor, police said on Thursday.

The Milpitas Police Department said that they received a request for a welfare check for the woman on Monday. The caller said she hadn’t heard from the woman, whose identity is not being released, for several days.

Officers checked the woman’s home but found nothing suspicious and launched a missing person investigation. While canvasing the area, neighbors reported hearing a woman screaming in the area on Saturday, although they did not report it at the time.

By Tuesday morning, investigators said they had found evidence near the victim’s home indicating a violent crime had been committed.

Detectives detained a neighbor, 34-year-old Micah James Dovlet, and executed search warrants at both his home and the victim’s home. Although they were unable to locate the victim, the investigators found enough evidence to charge Dovlet with murder.

The investigation uncovered information about the location of the victim’s body, and on Thursday, detectives returned to Dovlet’s home with another search warrant and found the body in the backyard.

No further information was released. Dovlet is being held at the Santa Clara County Jail.

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