MANCHESTER, Ky. — A U.S. census worker found hanged from a tree near a Kentucky cemetery had the word “fed” scrawled on his chest, a law enforcement official said Wednesday, and the FBI is investigating whether he was a victim of anti-government sentiment.
The law enforcement official, who was not authorized to discuss the case and requested anonymity, did not say what was used to write the word on the chest of Bill Sparkman, a 51-year-old part-time census field worker and teacher.
His decomposing body was found Sept. 12 in a remote patch of the Daniel Boone National Forest in southeastern Kentucky.
The U.S. Census Bureau has suspended door-to-door interviews in rural Clay County, where Sparkman was found, pending the outcome of the investigation.
Investigators have said little about the case. FBI spokesman David Beyer said the bureau is assisting state police and declined to discuss any details about the crime scene.
Attacking a federal worker during or because of his or her job is a federal crime.
Sparkman’s mother, Henrie Sparkman of Inverness, Fla., said her son was an Eagle Scout who moved to the area to be a local director for the Boy Scouts of America. She said he later became a substitute teacher in Laurel County and supplemented that income as a census worker.
Gilbert Acciardo, a retired Kentucky state trooper who directs an after-school program at the elementary school where Sparkman was a frequent substitute teacher, said he had warned Sparkman to be careful when he did his census work.
“I just was afraid that he might meet the wrong character,” he said.
The Census Bureau has yet to begin door-to-door canvassing for its 2010 head count, but it has thousands of field workers doing smaller surveys on behalf of federal agencies.
